Currently using some Denon in ear headphones and because they don’t always get a good seal when in the ear, the bass is completely lacking. It’s like listening on some 1995 walkman speakers at times.

They’re like this model but without the inline remote – http://www.denon.co.uk/uk/product/pages/product-detail.aspx?catid=headphones&subid=classicheadphones&productid=ahc260r

What do you recommend?

Don’t know what your budget is, but Soundmagic E10 are very good for £30ish. In-ears used with portables have a hard life so I don’t want to spend any more then that myself.

I was very lucky and got given a pair of Bose QC3’s and they are amazing. Especially when traveling. Reduces the back ground noise unbelievably well. Still here voices but engine noise , air conditioning almost disapears. Now having owned a pair I would pay the money myself to replace them.

Shure se215 if you can’t stretch to the etymotic thingies.

I have Bose QC15s which are great for travel use, but for more general in ear, walking about use, Etymotic MC2 would be my recommendation.

As an aside, am I the only one getting really irritated by the fact that headphone displays in shops now often don’t provide you with any means to try them out for sound, but do provide mirrors to allow you to see how orsumz you look in them? Grrrr.

I’ll second the Shure se215, I love the sound they give.

I have Denon AC-751’s and they’re ace but the tips were always a bit shoddy.

Try getting a set of these http://www.complyfoam.com/ memory foam tips before you bin a set of perfectly good buds.

They massively improve the fit, comfort and bass response, the only downside being that they do get a bit manky and waxy after a while, don’t get the colored ones.

i like the replaceable cable on the shure, had various sennheisers and they eventually get intermittent however careful you are with the cable.

I’ve killed numerous Sennheisers @ the drop of a hat, & there warranty department is shite, since moved onto RHA & their (3 year) warranty department are on the ball. The RHA aren’t stupidly expensive, well my MA450’s weren’t, are well made & seem great sound wise.

Yours

z1ppy killer of in-ear headphones

Shure SE215 for me. Sound proper lovely after a few weeks. Always a perfect seal with the shure olives too.

Etys are not renowned for their bass response; although I have the HF3s and love them. Agree with previous recommendations for the Shure SE215 for good balanced sound with a bit more bass.

AKG 451.

+1 for the Etymotics, I have had a pair of ER6-i’s for 5 years and they have been brilliant. Taken loads of abuse with good sound quality for the price.

OP – are you willing to look at over the ear and on the ear headphones as well?

Or do you just want in-ear ones?

Sennheisers cx 400 2’s Are £40ish on amazon and deliver a brilliant sound, very balanced and nice clean bass. Alot of people recommend them over more expensive equivalents. Depends How much cash you have to burn.

I use my Shure 425’s a lot. I’ve got the optional (£45 extra) Iphone lead so I can take calls and carry on working too.

Depending where I am, I have used these every day for a week at a time when I’m out working on my own so they are also comfortable too.

They were £215 but they sound absolutely lovely and after owning them for over 6 months, I’m still amazed at the sound quality.

Using EQ10 app on iphone to get a sound I like too.

I love the Etymotic sound – it’s very detailed, but not bass-heavy. Consensus is that the Shures are even better sounding.

In the past I found Shures to have limited durability – they lasted about 12 months per pair, but apparently that has been fixed.

But if you can afford £100 earphones, definitely check out the Shures

I’ve found that buying earphones is a very expensive pasttime! I think the performance of any given make/model is as much dependent on the shape of your ear as anything else.

I’ve had Denon’s (351s I think), and thought they were excellent, then got some C301 urban raver ones and had no end of problems with getting them seated.

I’m now on a set of B&W C5s which are very good, but not mind-blowing, which I’d expect if I paid RRP.

I tried some Shure’s and some Sennheisers and thought they were mince.

I go through in ear headphones pretty regularly as I travel a lot and listen to music a lot and also use them for lots of conference calls and phone calls (need inline mic), the Sennheisers ones were crap, sound quality ok but the cables pulled and then they were toast. wouldnt buy them again.

I replaced these with some nice looking bowers and wilkins C5’s, sound quality is good, could perhaps do with a bass boost for rock music but sound is generally good, even the cables seem pretty good and dont seem likely to get pulled out / ragged BUT the way they slot into your ear is just weird and they dont stay in very well. I’ve tried all the different size ear things and faffed and sadly when eventually they go I wont replace them with the same, shame for 120 quid.

The best ones were a 25 quid pair of jvc’s I had but then snapped the cables, grrrr, cant find them these days.

Your Denons have a rather limited 20-23,000hz response so i’m not surprised they sound rather bass light, as someone posted above the RHA Canalphone range are very good value for the money, even the most basic model the MA350 at £30 will be a decent upgrade as long as you can get a good seal with the included ear tips (which you should be able to), the MA600 and MA750 come with a good selection of in ear tips that are used to fine tune the fit for correct bass response.

They are available with an inline remote/mic if you need of of one and are backed up by a no quibble 3year warranty as well.

a rather limited 20-23,000hz response

What would a range that wasn’t “rather limited” be?

I’ve got the soundmagics and at 30 odd quid they are not bad, but I think they lacl bass. good sound otherwise, precise, controlled, well separated sound which I an listen too without tiring, but I’#d prefer a bit more bass

What I recommend is to get some triple-flange eartips for the Denons. They’ll cost you peanuts, and completely seal the ear canal, so you get proper bass. I use them on all my canalphones, and they make a world of difference. I think the ones from Mee Electronics fit the sound-tube on the Denons. The Denons are damned good ‘phones, certainly not worth replacing for the sake of some better eartips.
You could always go the custom route, but they’ll cost around £112.

johnners : I figure you’ve decided i’m digging myself a hole with the above response? 😉 , you’re prob right but it beats a long boring response regarding true dynamic range and artificially boosted frequencies that give the impression of deep sub bass rather than actual bass, I mentioned getting a good fit for correct bass response but perhaps i should have mentioned the additional “acoustic optimiser” as used by the denons above as being unnecessary and unnatural for correct bass response.

I’ll shut up and crawl back into the corner now.

Here for triple-flange eartips: http://www.meelec.com/product_p/tipset3-tf35m-mrg-cl.htm
They’ll cost you the outrageous sum of $4.99. Nobody seems to pay too much attention whenever I mention these, but the difference they make is fantastic, especially when used with phones that are as good as the Denons. Cheapest possible upgrade you can make. I have six sets of canalphones with these types of eartips attached, three MeeElectronics M6P Sports, Shure SE215, Ultimate Ears SuperFi 3 Pro and UE TripleFi 10 Studio, and every set of phones gave me problems getting a proper seal in my ears, with reduced bass as a result. Until I tracked down triple-flanged Eartips that would fit. It depends on the acoustic tube on the phones; lots, like the UE’s, and, I think, the Denons, use a large diameter tube, which the link above takes you to. Shures use a small diameter tube, same as Etymotics, so you can use the Shure triple-flange tips on Etys.
Honestly, just getting some of those will transform canalphones, and, unlike foam tips, they’re dead easy to clean, just by folding the flanges back and wiping with an antiseptic wipe.
My Etymotics have full custom eartips fitted, a luxury at £90 when I bought mine, but I was left feeling totally underwhelmed by their performance, especially after many people said how good they were.
I hadn’t used mine for around three years, until a week or so ago, when if had an idea, and had a search in the App Store, something I should have done ages ago. The stock EQ on iPods, iPhones, etc, is pretty rubbish, so I looked for one that allows a custom EQ to be set, and found one called EQu, which is brilliant, and it’s transformed the Eties, giving them some proper bass at last. Not the sort of bass that the UE’s, Shures and M6p Sports deliver, which sometimes feels like they’re trying to inflate your head, but pretty respectable.
Highly recommended, you can tweak and fine-tune the EQ curve to your heart’s content.

Here’s a screen grab of EQu in use, for anyone interested. From my iP4.

I’ve found that buying earphones is a very expensive pasttime!

Absolutely. Once you’ve had a good pair, you can’t really go back to cheaper options!

johnners : I figure you’ve decided i’m digging myself a hole with the above response?

Not exactly, I thought 20-23000Hz would comfortably bracket what most people could possibly hear, but I thought you may have had some cunning harmonics in mind! I must confess I’m very dubious about earbuds getting down to 20Hz too.

Neatly sidestepped though!

I’ve found that buying earphones is a very expensive pasttime!

Absolutely. Once you’ve had a good pair, you can’t really go back to cheaper options!

I’ll definitely be sticking to my cheapies then, I don’t have the money to splurge on what is, for me at least, pretty much a consumable item.

nicko74 – Member
I’ve found that buying earphones is a very expensive pasttime!

Absolutely. Once you’ve had a good pair, you can’t really go back to cheaper options!

Hmmm, I went through a pair of Denons, (the cheaper, £25 ones), and two pairs of Ultimate Ears, SuperFi 3 and SuperFi 5’s, all through broken cables, and various cheap ones, before I discovered the more expensive UE’s with replaceable cables, and the Shure 215’s, also with the replaceable cables. The Mee M6’s are dead cheap, when on offer; I got two pairs for $26 a while back. The Etymotics I bought after the Denons broke, from eBay. The same place I got the UE’s. Bit of a bargain, the TripleFi 10’s; cost me $160, IIRC, Amazon have them at the moment for $269 and $444.
I must admit to liking the Apple EarPods, soundwise they’re surprisingly good, very comfy, but they don’t seal the ear so well, so background noise leaks through. Still, they’re free with Apple stuff, and on eBay for a few quid, so cheap isn’t always crap. Handy to pop in when it’s quiet.
I was thinking about how effective EQu might be in making those overblown Beats by Dre headphones listenable….

Sorry – been away for a day or so.

Thanks for the advice in hear. Going to try some new eartips for the Denon’s first as the issue is down to not getting a good seal.