Etymotic ER4XR Extended Response Earphone

I felt compelled to write a review of these IEMs having obsessed about them for months now. They are all very good! They should be for the price! Haha. So where do I begin? Most important, above all is sound quality. They are all good with certain signature differences. I have been using Etymotics for years. Using the Etymotic hf3. Excellent overall. Very accurate. Just not a lot of punch or presence to the bass. It's there but doesn’t hit you over the head. I tried other brands of phones and found them to sound inaccurate or sloppy. I had some older Shure IEMs and I wanted to see if their newer models sounded better. I tried the Shure SE315. and the Shure SE425. Didn’t sound as good as my old model. Back they went. Decided I would need triple drivers to get a significantly better sound. Bought the Shure SE535. Lots of money! And wow! Very impressive! Having come from the Etymotics, the sound is very different. Its warmer and slicker sounding. The voice range is a little less forward, which may be simply because the bass presence and detail is huge compared to the Etymotics. The Shure SE535s are very entertaining to listen to. More so than the Etymotics. With the Shures, you feel more like you are being washed with music. With the Etymotics, it just feels more like you are analyzing the sound. There is way more punch and space to the sound in the Shure SE535s. Almost too much punch on certain tracks. 😳 Let me go back to the Etymotics. I tried out the Etymotic ER4XR and the Etymotic ER4SR. Very little discernible difference. Maybe slightly more bass presence with the XR. I have been using the Etymotic hf3 for many years. In my opinion, the hf3 sounds as good if not better than the ER4XR. The reason is that the ER4XR has a higher impedance than the hf3. On an iPhone, you have to turn up the volume essentially all the way to get the full sound out of the ER4XR. This is not the case with the hf3s. They are good at 3/4 volume. Makes a significant difference! Other than that, there is maybe a slightly discernible improvement in separation on the ER4XR. But I mean slight. Overall the hf3 sounds better. And they cost way less! And there is another point. Comfort. This is a tricky issue when it comes to IEMs. After trying to use the triple flange cone tips, I gave up do to discomfort and the scariness of sticking a little plastic Christmas tree up your ear canal. I found that using the cylindrical foam tips created just as good a sealed fit and bass response as the "tree" did. So that is what I use. The Soft Flex Sleeves are also an excellent alternative. Really good isolation and amazing bass response! That brings me to the difference between the Etymotics and the Shures. The Etymotics are simply more comfortable. The drivers are smaller and weigh less than the Shures. Less of a pull on your ear structure. Shures design is supposed to route the wire over and behind your ear. I find this distracting and annoying in addition to being uncomfortable. My solution is to let the wires remain in front of my ears, hanging down in front of me. Much more comfortable. (See photos) This however, necessitates using a shirt clip to cancel out the weight of the cord pulling on your ears. I bought some from Amazon. Works well to make the phones as weightless as possible. With the Etymotics, this is less of an issue because the earpieces weigh so much less and the foam goes straight into your ear canal. The Shures have to kind of sit on your ear structure. Not so comfortable. I'm hoping over time that I will be bothered less and less by this slight pressure. It is worth it to get the sonic results that the 535s deliver. Back to the Shures. I payed a very large amount for the 535s. For me they are worth it for the spectacular performance they deliver. I can only imagine how nice the Shure SE846s sound. I just couldn't bring myself to spend one thousand dollars on IEMs. I do after all have a family to support! 😛 So I am happy I have both. I will probably usually use my 535s for my daily commute to Manhattan. But it's nice to switch out to the Etymotics for a lighter more Spartan sound signature. Hope this review helps some of you out there. With streaming music, it's like being a kid in a candy store every day. And with these headphones, You can hear the candy really really well! 😊