IMR R2 Aten

Enlaces

Filtros y tips

Ended up with Red lower filter and Gold top. Perfect amount of bass slam and non piercing treble. Sounds great out of the box for classic rock.

I have two favorite setups right now. Typical pop recordings and newer stuff (brickwalled) is best with red filter/ green tips. Hip hop is AMAZING with this combo. Classical and traditional recordings (orchestral, especially romantic era, and American Songbook, rat pack, et al.) are better with purple filters and gold tips.

Just playing with them now. Currently using the gold treble filter and pink bass filter. I like that gold treble filter. What are you using? Pop stuff is red filter/ green tip. Orchestral/ classic vocal stuff are purple filter/ gold tip

Red/ red is pretty spicy if you have a darker source. Makes the Mojo pop like it's on fire.

The red/ green/ gold tips (descending order of treble/ upper treble) have a frequency contour that's less prone to hotness in the cymbals/ strings regions. You might try the red first and see if that helps.

Tried the green top filter with pink lower filter. This might be my new favorite for rock/jazz.

Came home to an interesting surprise. I've been leaving the R2s on pink noise while I'm out, and left the purple filter/ gold tip combo on from listening to Dvorak last night, fired up some Taylor Swift, and... Crazy HOT sibilants. Really uncomfortable, and I'd been using the golds to take a way some heat from violins in good lossless classical tracks. So, it seems there's something to this burn-in thing on the Atens after all :wink: After switching to the blue tips (no filter, but less hot in the 9k-10k range), this combo works great for pop tracks. Awesome, nice, controlled impact with body in the lower ranges and good height and texture in the mids and trebles. Interestingly, the purple filter has settled in to "just right" territory, losing a little resolution in the process, maybe more akin to what I heard from the red filters at first. It appears the giant DD and piezo have both worked their way around to doing something slightly different. So yes, do mess with the filters when you get the Aten fresh, just realize everything will eventually change. Burn-in: confirmed. Color this skeptic a contingent believer.

Where are you on filters and tips now, Rocko? Purple filters/ blue tips seem the ticket here while they're continuing to burn. Enough bottom, nice clear top and no hot treble.

Where are you on filters and tips now, Rocko? Purple filters/ blue tips seem the ticket here while they're continuing to burn. Enough bottom, nice clear top and no hot treble. Still enjoying the red lower and gold upper. Bear in mind though that I've only been using them at work this week, truly critical listening can wait until the weekend, I'd say mine are fully burned in so I can spend some quality time playing with them come Friday.

I did not find the Black on Black to be that bad. But yea, they can sound really nice with filters from the previous IMR IEM's. Especially the pink one is just perfect for my taste. Other Filter combination from the R2 you might want to try are the Red and Pink base filters, together with Pink, Green and Gold Tips. Especially Red-Green and Pink-Gold seem to work really well together.

Red is a great bassy, yet balanced filter. I love the treble contour of the Gold/ Green/ Red tips! Be aware, these really DO change over time. I'm still burning mine in, and the purple filters are around where the reds were new in terms of bass impact. Great IEMs. Bob did a killer job tuning them.

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/imr-r2-aten-thread.910206/page-31#post-15116146 Post 50 hour burn-in update.

Memory being what it is, I took notes on details that I could go back and objectively track, then compared them to current experience. When not listening, pink noise is running through my R2s at 80% volume using my Asus Xonar STX in High Performance mode.

The overall experience remains coherent, and more "fun" than quick, detailed and precise, as might be expected from a massive DD. The R2s prefer a neutral source with some power (LG G8 in aux mode) to a warmer source (Chord Mojo).
There was a notable shift in the piezo about halfway through burn-in, where the green tips, my go-to for pop-ish modern recordings, got WAY too hot in the upper treble regions (sibilants, cymbal crashes, etc.). After ~10 more hours of burn-in the issue resolved itself, and I was able to go back to the green tips again, but the treble had changed from my previous notes- it was no longer crystal clear and cutting, but had gained more weight and body. These are still not reference-neutral in the treble, but are solid and tangible in a way that balances and connects well with the rest of the signature.
I am NOT a basshead by any means. I prefer DF-neutral with slightly elevated clean and impactful bass, texture and details in the mids and smooth but precise treble that extends through the audible harmonic ranges and beyond. New, the R2s tilted hot in the subbass, and the slam and body continued into the midbass with quite a bit of weight and warmth- even to the point of overwhelming and overtaking the midrange (balance, not bleed) and feeling distorted (even though it wasn't, the bass felt that way), even slightly over-warm and bloated. The purple filters helped, but lost the impact of the red and black filters. After ~20 hours of burn-in I switched over to the purple flters full time for most things, because they were just so much cleaner than the red filters, although lacking visceral impact.

I switched back to the red filters today and noticed more visceral slam, just as they had been earlier, but midbass clarity and balance are markedly better, with bass guitars, bass violins and cellos the biggest benefactors. The purple is now bass how I generally prefer it- slightly elevated, clean and visceral- and red is clean bass but bigger and deeper, a "fun" take on my regular preference.

Current preference:

Red filter green tip for pop and modern recordings
purple filter blue tip for live recordings, traditional Americana
purple filter gold tip for classical orchestral, jazz

3 things real quick.

These are, as Bob describes them, IEMs for enjoying music, not for analyzing music. I'm a degreed musician with over 30 years of live performance and leadership experience. It's incredibly difficult for me to enjoy music without analyzing it. With the R2, I am enjoying music for its sake in a way I haven't experienced for years, maybe a decade.
If this were a typical IEM, I'd likely be satisfied with the purple filter blue tip combo for everything, but thanks to Bob's initiative, we're able to tune these in small ways until they are closer to ideal for our preferences. The filter and tip combo can be challenging at first, but it's more robust, and I think longer lasting than some of the micro switch solutions that are sweeping the industry.
I'm not a big burn-in believer. Out of all the IEMs, headphones, amps and speakers I've had through here, these are by far the best example of FR, even SQ changing with burn-in. The overall experience is just cleaner and more cohesive after 50 hours, as suggested by Bob, and I can't wait to see what 100 hours brings. At certain points in the process SQ changed for the worse. When you reach those points, adjust for the short term and keep going; it will get better. It will be worth it.

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/imr-r2-aten-thread.910206/page-33#post-15118099 Update: after 20 more hours of burn-in the treble has settled in to the point that red filters and green tips are now wonderful companions for classical (Dvorak) on a relatively neutral source like the LG G8 ThinQ in aux mode. Bass is a touch too impactful yet, but the top end has matured and is no longer strangely timbred.

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/imr-r2-aten-thread.910206/page-34#post-15118592 If you haven't tried Prokofiev or Buble' with gold filters yet, you're missing out. Very warm and tubey- feels like a warm blanket and a cup of hot chocolate, a big record console and an easy chair on a crisp fall day. Just way, way too comfortable- lovely. Kleiber's La Traviata MQA is divine with this filter.

Current filter/ tip favorites after ~70 hours of burn-in * Modern pop/ rock listening, general (modern) orchestral, baroque: pink/ pink * hip hop, EDM: red/ green * critical listening/ neutral(ish): green/ red * "comfortable" classical, Romantic era, Americana: gold/ black

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/imr-r2-aten-thread.910206/page-34#post-15120817 Received my R2s today :) After asking Bob his suggestion on a mid-forward but still treble-y sound, I've got the gold bottom / blue top filters w / JVC Spiral Dot combo going at the moment.

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/imr-r2-aten-thread.910206/page-36#post-15124310 Folks, I am in love. Everything burned in, as far as I can tell, listening to Debussy DSDs with the pink/ pink filters/ tips and Dekoni Mercury tips off my Mojo. Just absolute heaven, like my head is inside a Bosendorfer. Gorgeous. I'd drop down to red filters, and if it's still too much, try pink filters. I'm not a big bass fan when it's so much it overwhelms the rest of a balanced recording. The standard black filters were WAY too much for me off the bat, and still are. That's just not the music I listen to.

As I mentioned a few posts back, pink / pink are to die for on well recorded classical after burn-in. Just make sure you're getting a good seal.