It’s been a while since I’ve posted anything about my audio equipment (or about much of anything) ... So allow me to give a short comparison between two of the best universal fit IEMs available. It goes on and on, so allow me to place it below the fold.

Make no mistake about it—I like IEMs. There’s something very nice about enjoying a good stereo speaker system or some nice over-the-ear headphones, but nothing can isolate your environment and inject the sound directly into your hearing organs like IEMs. By this fact, you typically lose some amount of soundstage (vivid separate of instruments on the horizontal plane) when coming from more serious, over-the-ear headphones and certainly speakers. So in this respect, IEMs are about compromise: all these fancy drivers and electronics must be crammed into very tiny earphones.

Nonetheless, I’ve always been impressed at how they can so clearly articulate details—there’s just very little air between the drivers and your ear drums.

About a year ago, I became very interested in the newly announced Triple.fi 10 Pros from Ultimate Ears. UE was accepting preorders for them, but at $400, it was a bit expensive. The Shure E500 (SE530 is the new E500) was getting rave reviews (here’s mine) and the street price was nearer to $300 since they’d been out for a while. Needless to say, I lept on them and didn’t think too hard about the Triple.fi’s.

Well, when I recently had to send my E500’s back to Shure for replacement due to the infamous cracking cables (which it seems they have now addressed with newer batches of the SE530) I decided I would try the Triple.fi’s as I’d heard great things and they now have a more appealing street price.

I’m going to focus on two primary characteristics of these phones: sound quality and comfort.

The E500 has quite a deep bass that slams. This bass blends nicely into a warm, smooth midrange. I love these things about this earphone, but it does lack the ability to reproduce sounds in the highest range of our audible spectrum. These sounds aren’t required to enjoy the music by any stretch. In fact, many reviewers have not discounted these earphones much for this deficiency. They still sound great for pop and beat-driven music. But these high frequencies cause the shimmer and sparkle that really gives you a sense that the instrument is actually being played before you. The Etymotic ER4 is said to have this, but lack the bass.

Enter the Triple.fi 10 Pro.

These things seem to have it all. The tight, detailed bass doesn’t overstep it’s bounds quite like the E500, but remains very present, extended, and integrated! Their very clean, airy, non-fatiguing high end is the main contributer to the realism that the E500 lacks.

It seems that in this case, sound quality and comfort are mutually exclusive. The Triple.fi’s require a twisting motion to lodge their short and fat nozzle in the ears with the proper seal. They don’t really hurt much if I put them in properly and don’t touch them, but eventually I’ll reach up to reposition and realize that they’re causing a minor earache. It’s too darn easy to lose the seal, too. And this is all not making a fuss over how goofy they look, sticking out of your ears. The E500, by comparison, slips straight in quite smoothly and comfortably, keeps a low profile, and is quite ergonomic to use. To me, it wins hands down in comfort.

As good as the E500 is, I think Ultimate Ears can provide an even more accurate and balanced spectrum of sound with a clearer separation of instruments. But how do you get this amazing level of UE sound quality with comfort? Well, I’ll tell you. You get a custom earphone.

That’s right, I’m settling for neither and dropping the big bucks on their highly touted UE11. This way, I can avoid the whole decision and make off with not just a custom in-ear monitor (with all their benefits) but an insanely good one that should surpass my wildest expectations. More on this later.

If I had to choose between the E500 and the TF10 in direct comparison, it would be a very difficult choice. Both the E500’s comfort and the TF10’s sound quality are impressive and sought after. I’d ask myself which is more important (uncompromising sound quality or comfort) and let that be the deciding factor.