Campfire - Equinox custom IEM !

@mscott58

Thank you for the detailed photos and first look!

These are the most tasteful and understated CIEM I have ever seen.

 

Just sent off my impressions to Ken so they can get to work on my Equinox. It was one of the best things I heard at RMAF. Between the Andro S (loved it, but not quite enough to replace my V1 Andro), this and the Comet at RMAF Ken and everyone at CFA are killing it right now.

 

Totally agree - they exude class IMO. Also, they're not so ostentatious as some of the other ear candy out there, and draw less attention, which is a good thing, unless you're trying to show off (like a certain IF editor who said they wear LCD's out in public...)

 

That's great. Glad you enjoyed them. I've been really liking mine and need to get even more of my review posted sometime soon.

The Equinox are my go-to travel IEMs now, although I am eagerly awaiting the Solaris, especially given what Ken said about them in the Solaris thread - "Not to sound cocky or anything but if we are comparing sonic and build value we could ask for well into the 3K+, easy.." Can't wait to hear the reports that should be coming out of Tokyo in a week or so!

 

@mscott58 since you have both Equinox and Solaris, the burning question that I have is... how do they compare?

 

@HAL9000 - Great question! Let me get the Solaris burned in a bit more so the DD can settle in until I provide a deeper comparison.

However, I'll stick with my prior statement on the Solaris thread - the Solaris is more like the Equinox/Atlas and the Andromeda had a love child, or put another way, like the Andromeda with more cojones - it has the imaging of the Andros (or maybe even more?) with the lower-end impact of the Equinox.

The form factor is quite different though. In order to fit the 10mm DD, the 3 BAs and the cross-over PCB the Solaris is quite a bit bigger/thicker than the Equinox. The CIEM Equinox is pretty much flush with the ear (at least with my impressions/ear shape) while the Solaris sticks out quite a bit and requires a good tip to fit well. Not a huge trade-off IMO, but needs to be known.

Cheers

 

Hey, @mscott58 I was wondering due both the Solaris and Equinox have a more stable impedance curve (I don't know how to phrase it properly) compared to the Andromeda or do they react like them depending on the source?

 

Well Campfire continues to blow me away. My Equinox got shipped out to me today after they had just received my impressions last Monday most likely. Thanks again to @KenBall for taking so much time to talk to just some kid about your work when you could have been getting yourself into videos and articles. I will post impressions sometime this weekend or next week hopefully, got an exam a day until the end of the week.

 

Deutsche Hifi Tage Impressions Part 5: Equinox

Part 1: PP8
Part 2: Andromeda S
Part 3: Solaris
Part 4: Vega

Alright, finally found some time to write down my thoughts on the Equinox. Once again, I only used my phone (Galaxy S8 S835) as a source. The Equinox shells seems extremely rigid to me and they're also very heavy. I bet it's really well damped. Like with the Vega I also ended up using EQ to make it more linear. This one didn't have any driver flex. Obviously these are universal demos. Supposedly the CIEMs have less bass and less treble, so overall a more neutral sound, which would definitely be a welcome change. As is I found these even more bassy than the Vega, with even less air. Here are the EQ settings I used in Neutron:

• Low shelf 48Hz, Q 0.35 -12db
• Peak EQ 27Hz, BW 2.31, -3.95db
• Peak EQ 7530Hz, BW 0.8, -7.12db
• High shelf 11880Hz, Q 1.06, 7.51db

As you can see, more of a bass reduction and a bigger boost in the upper treble vs the Vega. I also heard less of a treble peak and I found the lower frequency worked better here. But I still have to admit that I disagree with @ultrabike when he said that he doesn't hear "f'ing sharp peaks 10 dB style", at least when it comes to most in-ears. The 7db reduction at 7.5kHz was absolutely necessary to me. (These peaks seem to be the rule for me with most IEMs, not the exception. Only the very best IEMs manage to have treble that I don't hear either as super peaky or rolled off.) Without EQ I didn't like them at all, but with EQ I could see some potential.

What struck me the most in comparing them to the Vega was that the staging was more three dimensional overall. More expansive and bigger stage with a better sense of depth and openness. Also I thought these had a greater imaging precision. However over time I felt that the imaging lacked any sense of layering. It all just seemed to be coming from the outer edge of a circle floating in space around my head. I can hear more layers on my UERM and even on the RE272, despite it having a smaller stage than the Equinox overall.
I also felt they had better macrodynamics than the Vega, especially with a harder hitting bass, but I also felt the bass was really weird. Especially without EQ it felt like speakers hitting a room mode, except it hit it every single time it played a bass note. Maybe that's just what it sounds like when you have this much bass, since I'm definitely not used to bass levels even close to the universal demo of the Equinox I heard.
Without EQ I thought the upper mids were quite recessed, but with EQ it wasn't too bad anymore. I don't think the mids around 2-3kHz are more recessed than the Vega, but it's possible that the upper mid-lower treble transition is more recessed. Guitars sounded a bit too mushy overall. The EQ I was using was also less accurate than the one I used for the Vega, as I felt the midrange was overall a bit wonky even after EQ. I'm sure this would go away if I spent more than 3 minutes with the EQ settings.
The sibilance was pretty brutal without EQ, but this is supposedly a lot better on the CIEM. I wrote down "sibilance kills you in your sleep" before I made the EQ profile, but it's likely not as bad as the Vega.

The main reason I was curious to try the Vega and Equinox however was that Marv mentioned that the driver coloration is like that of the Accuton diamond drivers. This also ended up being what disappointed me the most - I just didn't find that to be the case. The Accuton drivers have this incredible speed and microdynamics with a very natural transient response and a clarity and blackground that are hard to match. Especially when I heard the Tidal Akira with its 5" diamond midrange I realized how much I liked the diamond drivers.
The Campfire IEMs are similarly low in coloration, but I don't find their transient response and microdynamics get close to the Accuton drivers. They really reminded me more of the Raidho "diamond" drivers. Overall I thought they sounded too dull, not lively enough. As if they were coated until they no longer sounded like plastic, which ends up making everything sound too damped instead. In comparison I think my RE272 is a more lively sounding IEMs, but it also has a strong plasticky coloration. It comes down to preference. Would you rather err on the side of sounding too overdamped or too underdamped?

I think it's a consequence of this damped sound that the Equinox didn't sound as lively, and frankly didn't have the microdynamics and resolution of the best HFM DD IEM or the best BA IEMs. They go loud cleanly and with less distortion than the Vega, but I always thought it compressed the low level information and even lost some of it. I just couldn't stop thinking that the driver was too heavy, that the coating was too thick for its own good. I do not think this is a matter of driver size as I also thought the Vega had the same issues, maybe even more so. Overall I still preferred the Equinox over the Vega. With the right EQ I might even take it over the Andromeda for its clean, coherent and uncolored sound two or three times a week, but I don't think it gets there in terms of technicalities. Still, the timbre in the midrange and treble and well damped transient characteristics can't be replicated by any other IEM as far as I know, so if that's what you're looking for the Equinox might be it.

FWIW I also heard the Ether 2 at the same table that I mentioned in the Vega post. I do think it's a step (or three) forwards compared to the Ether Flow which I thought was one step forward, two steps backwards compared to the original Ether. I thought the new FR was really agreeable and I also didn't hear a 20db dip in the treble like the measurements suggest, but overall I still didn't find it a top level technical performer even compared to mid-fi phones like the Susvara or the HE6SE.

 

That's some expensive mid-fi right there.

 

You already know Germans always take things literally and have no sense of humor or sarcasm and I'm not any better than average.
I was only half joking when I chose my name.

@ultrabike Yes, me neither and I never mentioned that. I do hear narrow peaks and dips in the treble at very similar frequencies on the HD600 and HD800 (7, 8, 9 and 11kHz), but not 10db.
I realize I worded it poorly, but you did mention that you don't hear the peaks with IEMs as measured, which is what I meant, not over ears.

@purr1n As I read it now I realize I didn't specifically mention it, but what I meant is that the timbre sounded closer to the Raidho D series drivers than the Accuton diamond drivers to me. I only talked about those two, not sure which other manufacturers you are talking about. I only mentioned the Raidho because that's what they reminded me of.

But I also realized that it doesn't really matter which speaker drivers they remind me of as they don't sound like speakers or those drivers anyway. They still sound like their own special drivers and I found the Vega and Equinox to sound more similar than not.

 

The universal version of the Equinox is not nearly as good as the CIEM proper version, however it gives a good idea of the final full CIEM. That being said I respect your impressions but I clearly am not hearing what your hearing on both IEMs.

Kb