Custom 3 review

[Jay481985]

I am reluctant to admit that I hear things I have not heard on my rf-83s on the custom 3's.

If not for the chest thumping bass, the customs 3 are amazing.

[skonopa]

Well, I just ordered a pair of Custom-3's today. Will be interesting to see how they sound compared to the Shure e3c's that I currently have.

According to the guy at Raven Hi-Fi that I ordered them from, they should be here in around 5 days.

Sweet - now even my headphones will be proudly displaying the copper oval!

[Jay481985]

skonopa, you might give up on your rf-7 [] just kidding, but I find it one of the best headphones out there.

Here is another snippet, on some songs like songs from The Chemical Brothers, you can actually feel the headphone vibrate in your ear its producing soo much bass. It can actually break the seal if the seal was a bit loose. I know what you are thinking this was at max power, no actually I was about 1/3 power coming from my computer soundcard.

[skonopa]

Nope - not giving up the '7s []

Anyway, still waiting for my damn headphones show up!

Tommorrow (if I don't forget due to being swamp with work), I'll have to call up the Raven Hi-Fi guys and see what the story is - hoping the things have arrived, but they never got around to telling me.

I am really looking forward to getting these.

[LoudnClear]

mcqueene, you have both the custom 3 and image according to your signature at the bottom of the posts. Which sounds the best? which would your recommend?

Kimball

[customsteve01]

Steve, you are really going to be impressed with the 3's..... Steve

[pretzelb]

I ended up sticking with the Custom 3 and sending the Image back. I'm probably the only who ever did send the Image back. The one thing that I didn't like on the Image was the cord noise when it rubbed on my shirt. My girlfriend had a similar issue with the cord hitting her hair. It wasn't an issue all the time (I'm not sure why) but given the price I didn't want the issue to be there at all. The Image were just awesome for comfort and isolation, and I'd maybe pick some up on sale or second hand, but in the end I had to go with the Custom 3.

When doing an A/B test between the Custom 3 and the Image it was really close. I would listen with the Image and think "No way it can get better - this is the best". Then I'd force myself to listen to the Custom 3 and found myself saying "Wait, what was that? I never heard that on this song before." I am able to get a good seal, but I've read that others have issues getting a good seal. I do find that I adjust or fiddle with my Custom 3s off and on, especially if I wear them on the go, but they are still comfortable to me.

You can't go wrong with either (if you get a good seal with the Custom 3). I wanted to keep the Image but I end up turning my head a lot when I listen at work and the noise was just a deal breaker at that price. But I'm the only one I've ever seen have this issue.

[skonopa]

Steve, you are really going to be impressed with the 3's..... Steve

Well, well, well - look have arrived this morning! [H] I was just stepping out for work this morning when I got that magic call on my cellphone from Raven Hi-Fi here in Fredericksburg saying they are in!!! Of course, had to stop by on the way to work and pick them up.

Yes, to cut right to the chase - friggan awesome! I am indeed very impressed with these!

While doing some testing/debugging of code (one test required me to let the software to run for quite a bit of time to see if I can reproduce one particular problem). Since I had my iPod with me (love that iPod hook-up in my car!), as well as these brand-new Custom-3 headphones, what the heck - lets try these babies out!

First the packaging. I think the packaging was really cool and very well done. Yes, it was a bit of work to get in, but I found it easier to get into the packaging for these than I did getting into that nearly bullet-proof clamshell packaging that my Shure E3c's came in! []

These headphones come with a very nice assortment of accessories. The case is also very nice (these things alone would easily go for $20-$30), although somewhat on the large size. I did really like the small hard-shell case that came with my Shure E3c's, though, until I lost the darn thing on the bus here in town. I'll probably go and check with lost-n-found at the bus depot and see if it turned up. Anyway, it is cool that my 160-gig iPod Classic does fit in the case that came with the Custom-3's, although I already have a nice leather case for it. Still, a very nice touch and glad to see Klipsch included it. I've also notice a number of nice details, such as the inclusion of an "airplane" adapter as well as a 1/4 inch adaptor (later tonight, will have to try these on my stereo, as there are a few CD's on I want to listen to through these things that I don't have ripped into my iPod yet, such as the new Ayreon album). Also very nice was the large assortment of earcaps that was included. After some experimentation, found out that the large single-flange earcaps seemed to be the best fit for my particular ears (seem on par with the "medium" ones that came with my Shure E3c's). I've tried the default "medium" ones, but could not seem to get a good seal. I then tried the larger of the two "double-flange" sizes, but they would not stay in my ear - tried pushing them in, but kept popping back out. I then tried the largest set of the included "single-flange" size and these seem to work the best for me.

Once I found out the correct size of earcap for my ears, I've noticed just how much more comfortable these things are than the Shure E3c's where! Also very nice that the earcaps "lock on" the post, thus hopefully no unfortunate situation with an earcap getting stuck in the ear. I've actually had this happen to me on the way back from Steamboat, CO. with my Shure's. While listening to them on the bus ride back from Steamboat to the Denver airport (A solid 3-hours right there), one of the earphones came out, with the earcap stuck in my ear. I ended up having to visit the emergency clinic at the Denver airport to have the doctor remove it - a nice little $150 "woops" - to add to the cost of an already expensive ski trip [8o|]. Hopefully, with this new design of these Klipsch headphones, that will not happen (again). Still, if the earcap seems "loose" and tends to come off too easy, do not insert them in your ears, until you get a replacement set of earcaps - seems over time the rubber around the shaft of the earpiece stretches out and "looses up". At least I had a spare set of earcaps for the Shure's, so I was still able to enjoy my music on that 4 1/2 hour non-stop flight back from Denver to Dulles, without any farther problems. Turned out that doctor also had the same pair of earphones and she was like, "I was afraid something like this was going to eventually happen!"

Now, to get to the sound! Wow! First, the clarity of these things is just truly incredible! Of course, I was expecting so much from a Klipsch product! Picking out probably the best recorded album that I had at my disposal on my iPod, I went and listened to Vox Tempus - In The Eye of Time. This is one very well recorded album - very dynamic, with a nice strong, tight bassline, and no hint of compression that I can tell. The lead vocalist comes out very clear and easy to understand. I can easily pick out each of the individual instruments. The opening guitar in the track "Love-Lies-Treason" sounded very clean, crisp and clear. Could actually hear the pick as it strums across the strings - very nice indeed! In the opening track, "For Every Life", the bassline came across very clean, with a nice authority, but not so overbearing (just never cared for that over-exggerated, "tubby" sounding bass that I hear to often from those stupid "boom-cars" that there are to many of around here). These things definitely has an edge on the Shure E3c's when it comes to the bass department. The bass is very clean, tight, and accurate on these. I don't have any really bass heavy material on hand to test just how much bass these things can produce. However, there are a couple of tracks on the new Ayreon album (01011001) that has some bass that hits pretty low and heavy, that sounds really awesome on my full-sized rig. Will be curious to see what this tiny little Custom-3s can handle that. Overall, I am very impressed with these thing, and they are definitly a step-up from the Shure E3c's (wonder how they compare to the more comparable Shure E4c's, as the E3c's would be closer in class to the Klipsch Custom-2s)

Overall, impressive indeed! I love the clarity of the sound these thing produce, complete with the crsytal clear treble and md-range, along with the nice, tight, clean accurate bass. Not only that, much more comfortable than the Shure E3c were. I'll still keep my trusty'ol Shure as a "backup" pair (and admittedly, I do really like how the Shure's sounded, but these are definitely a whole new class. Excellent job - Klipsch! Can finally proudly wear the Klipsch badge on the headphones as well! Now, if I can only get something for the car as well.....

[skonopa]

Custom 3 review - part 2

Finally got a chance to do an A/B listening, comparing my Shure E3c's with the Klipsch Custom 3's.

First, I went and put in the new Ayreon album - 01011001 and plugged the headphones directly into the headphone output right on the front of my Denon DCM-380 5-disk CD player/changer - which was actually pretty nice as that took out down-chain components, thus I was getting the material directly out of the CD player:

Track #2 on CD 1, "Comatose", has a seriously killer bass line, so I wanted to test how the bass sounded through the Custom 3 vs the E3c's. They both delivered excellent, clean, accurate bass (and was actually quite surprised at just how well the Shure E3c's did with this), but the Custom 3's delivered a more powerful bass response. I can see what "Jay481985" above means about when the headphone seems to "rattle" in the ear due to the strong bass. I've also went and listed to Track #6 on CD 2, "E=mc^2". I've also noticed that the mid-range seemed a bit clearer in the Custom 3's compared to the E3c's, but the E3c certainly did not disappoint in thier own right. Unfortunatly, I did notice a bit of compression on the "heavier" parts of the tracks that I've listened to from this album, which I did find a bit disappointing, especially as the Ayreon disks have been known to be very well recorded. I may have to dig out my other Ayreon disks and see if this is evident, or if this is something that was recently done with the new one. However, I also did notice on the quieter parts, the instruments really seem to have thier space, such as on the last track of CD 1, "Web of Lies", which consisted of only a cello, violin, guitar, female vocals and male vocals. Both of the sets of headphones rendered this track very nicely, although, again, I throught the Custom 3 exhibited a bit more clarity in the treble and mid-range. Also, the Klipsch seems to be a bit more sensitive, as I found I had to turn the volume up a tad bit with the Shure E3c's to get equivelent output. I've also notice the same thing on the very haunting chorus line of the track "E=mc^2", which consisted of a female vocal with a violin in the background:

"This is our last chance

if we want man to survive

A mirror reflection

Show them our world as it dies

Cut through the barrier

And do what no one has dared

Let's break the equation - E=mc^2"

After this little listening test, the Custom 3 are definitly a step up from the Shure E3c's. However, I think a more fairer comparison would be to compare these with the Shure E4c's, as the Custom 2 would be a closer analog to the E3c's. Still, I was also impressed at just how good the Shure's sounded as well. Not only that, but both sets of these headphones have excellent build quality and comes with a nice selection of accessories (still bumed that I lost the case to my Shure's, though) I'll be keeping the Shure's as a backup set of headphones. However, there is thing that really put the Custom 3's ahead of the E3c's, though, and that is shear comfort! The Custom 3s were just so much more comfortable to wear. The E3c's, just after a fairly short time, seemed to start irratating my ears. With the Custom 3s, I did not experience this anywhere nearly as severly as I did with the E3c's, although after awhile, even the Custom 3 did start to somewhat irrated my ears a little bit as well, though. Just seems to be the nature of IEM's, unfortunatly, or I just have sensitive ears. Still, I can seem me wearing these things on a non-stop flight to San Francisco and not have any issues at all.

Earlier this evening, I did put the Custom 3s through what I consider my ultimate test - use them at the gym for my fairly rigorous workout routing, including 1/2 hour of cardio and then a full circuit of weight training. Nearly every set of headphones that I've tried, including the cheapy stock ones that come with my MP3 players have always seem to fall out and I find myself constantly putting them back in - even the Shure E3c's. However, although I was a little bit leery of taking a pair of $300 headphones to the gym, but since I had them with me - might as well try them out. I was really amazed at just how well these thing stayed with me in my ears, and not only that, very comfortable - almost like I did not even have them in, and the music was just "magically" being put in my head. They sounded good even with my nearly ancient Creative MuVo Slim (with all 512 megs of memory - but hey, when I bought the thing - that was considered "huge" at the time). Unfortunatly, I did not have the greatest selection of quality tracks on there. That old Gamma Ray and Guardians of Time tracks I had on there really did sound compressed, with no bass, and fairly muddy mid-range. At least the Metalium tracks on there were much better recorded and sounded better. That old Creative MuVo Slim was (and still is, in my opinion) an excellent MP3 player, which is why I still use it to this day, despite the somewhat smallish memory capacity, compared to the gigabytes that can fit on more modern MP3 players, such as the newer iPod Nano's. The thing is sound good, very small and light weight, and rugged as he11. That thing as seen more use and abuse over the past few years, but like an old Timex - keeps on ticking!

To sum it up - the Custom 3s are really a sweet pair of headphones, with excellent clarity, dynamics as well as very clean, accurate bass that is delivered with authority. Not only that, but they are fairly lightweight (although that is one place the E3c's do have an advantage - these are smaller and very lightweight), although not quite as small as the Klipsch Images. At least for me, they seemed to sit comfortably with my ear and the size did not bother me. And most importantly (and one of the main reasons why I bought these things in the first place, instead of just simply staying with my Shure E3c's) is they are very comfortable to wear, and really seem to stay well into my ear, help by no small part with the wire that fits around the back of the ear.

Awesome job here Klipsch - never thought I'd see the day we'd have Klipsch headphones, but here (or shall I say "hear") they are, and like nearly everything else Klipsch, these things are friggan awesome. $300 may seem like a lot for a pair of headphones, but I am hearing these things really hang very well with some of the even more expensive models out there, including a pair costing something like $1100 (I can't seem to find the link anymore, so don't remember what the manufacture/model of those were). Now to register to get my two pairs of free earcaps for these things (always nice to have plenty of spares).

[Amy]

Thank you so much for the in-depth review, Steve! Great stuff...

[Professor Thump]

To sum it up - the Custom 3s are really a sweet pair of headphones, with excellent clarity, dynamics as well as very clean, accurate bass that is delivered with authority. Not only that, but they are fairly lightweight (although that is one place the E3c's do have an advantage - these are smaller and very lightweight), although not quite as small as the Klipsch Images. At least for me, they seemed to sit comfortably with my ear and the size did not bother me. And most importantly (and one of the main reasons why I bought these things in the first place, instead of just simply staying with my Shure E3c's) is they are very comfortable to wear, and really seem to stay well into my ear, help by no small part with the wire that fits around the back of the ear.

Awesome job here Klipsch - never thought I'd see the day we'd have Klipsch headphones, but here (or shall I say "hear") they are, and like nearly everything else Klipsch, these things are friggan awesome. $300 may seem like a lot for a pair of headphones, but I am hearing these things really hang very well with some of the even more expensive models out there, including a pair costing something like $1100 (I can't seem to find the link anymore, so don't remember what the manufacture/model of those were). Now to register to get my two pairs of free earcaps for these things (always nice to have plenty of spares).

Steve,

It is alway inspiring to see people enjoy products that you have worked on. This is really a great review with all the levels of application testing that you have done. You have rationalized some of the design features just as we have intended. I agree that one of the demanding tests is working out with IEM's and that was one of the areas we wanted to stand out from the crowd... Comfortable even when you are working out.

Thanks for taking the time to give us your feedback.

[pretzelb]

You worked out with them? Often when I'm in the gym I DESPARATELY wish I could block out the music they play but I never dreamed of using my Custom 3 for that purpose. I would worry too much about damaging them while moving around. Plus, it would seem to me that sweating on them would be pretty bad for them. I'm not sure I want to do that to my high-end IEMs. Maybe someday I'll try it but I'll also have to get a portable player because the 80gb iPod video is too big for the gym.

[skonopa]

You worked out with them? Often when I'm in the gym I DESPARATELY wish I could block out the music they play but I never dreamed of using my Custom 3 for that purpose. I would worry too much about damaging them while moving around. Plus, it would seem to me that sweating on them would be pretty bad for them. I'm not sure I want to do that to my high-end IEMs. Maybe someday I'll try it but I'll also have to get a portable player because the 80gb iPod video is too big for the gym.

I would not be to worried about damaging from while moving around. They seem to be very well built, plus it sounds like (as I gather from reading Prof. Thump's posting abouve), they designed these things so they could be used even in such an environment and purpose. I certainly sweated on them, and it did not seem to hurt them the least bit. Still, I'll admit that I was a bit leery myself of taking these things into the gym, but at the time, I had them with me, so I figured what the heck, I'll try them out, and was really surprised at how well they worked in such an enviroment. For the most part, I'll probably still use the cheap Sony headphones that I currently use, since they are cheap and if the unthinkable happens, at least I'll only be out about $30 instead of $300. Still, the Custom 3s are definitly way better than those cheay Sony's in both sound quality and ability to stay in my ear.

As for the player itself. Yeah, that is why I am still using my ancient Creative MuVo Slim player. My 160gig iPod is definitly to big and bulky for use at the gym. As old as that Creative player is (it only has 512 megs of capacity, for example), it still is an excellent player, with good sound quality, small (not much larger than a credit card), light weight, and rugged. I've taken it on hikes, to the pool, to the gym, camping, etc and it still works like a charm (although one of the buttons on it has been sticking somewhat, requiring me to press it several times before it registers - plus the case I have for it is getting pretty worn as well). One of these day I'll probably replace it for the simple fact that I'd like to get more capacity.

[Professor Thump]

You can experience temporary changes to the performance of Klipsch Headphones when they are exposed to moisture such as sweat but the will typical return to their original performance once they dry out. You can accelerate this by buying a dehumidifier box from most hearing aid companies. Just don't try putting them in the clothes dryer because that can damage the armature. We actually do chemical sweat tests which simulate human sweat. Headphones have to survive many elements of physical exposure including shock and drop test. Which are the toughest tests to pass.

[kaiser SET say]

Muchos Garcia's Steve, I have been looking for IEM's with the bass response of these[]

[TheEAR]

Well well....I am getting the Klipsch Image and Custom-3 . []

They are so cute in the nice little clear boxes...holding the actual box,well done packaging. I will compare these to my good few headphones (AKG,Sennheiser,Grado,Koss and company).

Way to go Klipsch,quality in ear.