dmc79

Thanks. My usual place for picks (Dirty Riffs Guitar Shop on eBay) doesn’t stock them, and I can’t see anywhere selling them in less than 12. Never mind.

I'd like to try these someday but I'm yet to find anywhere that sells them in smaller quantities than a tin of 12. I'd happily buy 3 each of purple .60, red .73 and black .88 to try, but don't want 12 of each! I asked in another pick thread and didn't get an answer, but is the grip on these similar in feel to that of the Dunlop Max Grips? I wanted to like that grip but wasn't all that keen on it, yet am still curious about these for some reason even though they look similar. Also are they similar in flex to Dunlop nylons? Thanks.

It's a minor annoyance not showing L or R on the ZS10 earpieces, but I know which is which now. I got so used to the 'red for right' dot on the Shures. I guess things like this detail, and the lack of an instruction manual or case, are the downsides of having a cheap set of IEMs. The upside is that they sound really great which is the main thing.

After one service using the KZ ZS10 Pro IEMs, I must say I'm rather impressed with them. Half the price of the Shure SE215 that everyone else in the band uses, including myself until I had 2 pairs of them bust. Stupidly I made the mistake of only being handed them as were about to start practicing that Sunday morning for the upcoming service. I should know better by now and should have picked them up a couple of days before to get familiar with them, but I spent most of the practice time fiddling about with them, they were falling straight out of my ears and wouldn't stay put, I couldn't see a L or R on the earpieces or the cable, and was getting rather flustered - couldn't work out which earpiece was which or if I had the cable on properly, and to make it worse there were no instructions in the box. Meanwhile the practice continued as we had limited time. I had it partially sorted with the help of the WL & PA guy during the short break before service, enough that I could hear what I needed, but I still felt a bit confused with it all and wasn't sure everything was right. I liked what I heard though. I did some digging online when I got home, and found this piece of advice regarding how to spot quickly which is the L and R earpiece: Also, I hadn't spotted it under the platform lights on Sunday, but the cable does have L and R stated on it, over the gold 2 pin connectors, near the angled bend. Still a bit frustrating that there's no L and R on the earpieces themselves, but after seeing that explanation and spotting the L and R markings on the cable, at least I know what I'm doing now. Also, compared to the SE215, they feel more comfy because the connector doesn't rotate, which means the ear loop doesn't turn away from my ear every time I move my head - I always found the ear loop of the Shures intrusive, annoying & stiff, but the KZ one goes back over the ear much more easily than the annoying high & wide loop of the Shure. The KZ cable is quite short compared to the Shure, but I never liked the bulk of the Y splitter pulling on the cable on that one, so it feels more comfy. That said, it almost feels too cheap and light - it looks like a cable you'd expect to see on some pound shop earphones. After seeing plenty of recommendations, I've got a Tripowin Zonie 16 core cable upgrade on the way (recessed 2 pin / QDC, 3.5mm). This is meant to be more sturdy & some say it improves the sound of the IEMs too. The stock silicone tips seem ok - they are a lot better than expected, especially as I moved over to foam from silicone - I think partly they stay in better because of the fact that the ear loop isn't always coming away like it did on the Shures. But I'll probably get some Comply foam tips too as I'm sure getting a good seal will take these to another level. Once I've figured out which size I like best (I got an assorted size Comply pack recently for the Shure SE112s I use to play music through at home), I'll order a set for the ZS10s. Sound-wise, I've only played a few songs with them on a Sunday (this week will be my first time actually knowing what I'm doing with them without fiddling about like a buffoon) but I thought they sounded pretty good - plenty of detail and clarity and overall better than the SE215. A bit more high end than I'm used to, especially when the drummer went to town on the hi-hat, but I just turned him down a bit on the mixer. I guess I'll get used to it. I would sometimes get the bass distort a little with the SE215 depending on the Gain on my Tone Hammer DI (even though I don't crank it much at all), so hopefully the ZS10 can deal with that better. The casing seems quite rugged against the cheap plastic feel of the Shures, I thought at first they'd feel bulky, but they didn't seem overly big once firmly in place. Hopefully they won't be too fatiguing. Anyway, as many of you no doubt already know, it seems the KZ ZS10 Pro is an excellent budget IEM which punches well above its price (approx £50). I played some music through them at home and was actually blown away by the sound, they blew my Shure SE112, which cost the same price (and don't have a detachable cable) out of the water. Admittedly those are Shure's cheapest earphones anyway, but they themselves are way better than any Sennheiser, Sony, etc, I've tried at that price range, yet the ZS10s are on a different level completely.

I'm sure I'll pick some up myself soon, but I wondered if anyone has any thoughts on the Dunlop Nylon Midi picks? Regular nylons, tortex, etc, always seem to get mentioned a lot, but I hardly see any mention of the Midi, either here or on TB. I mean these ones: https://www.jimdunlop.com/nylon-midi-pick-67mm/ I plan to give the orange .67 & yellow .80 a go sometime. Their site description says: "Nylon Midi Standard picks provide the classic warmth of nylon with the unique feel and flexibility of "in-between" gauges." I'm just curious as to if they play exactly like a regular JD nylon, or a touch stiffer like the Max Grips. They have a good looking raised grips that's different from both the regular nylon & max grips. If it's the former, the .67 may be too flappy, but if it's the latter then this might be spot on for me. I will get some anyway, but just curious as I hardly ever see the Midi picks mentioned. I'm guessing the main appeal is the inbetween gauges, but just interested in how they feel & play compared to a regular nylon & a max grip nylon. Thanks

Well after my second set of Shure SE215 IEMs crapped out (last set didn’t last long at all), after putting a request in for a set of KZ ZS10 Pro, it didn’t take much persuading for me to be bought a set of them & the fact they are half the price of the Shures may have helped. Looking forward to trying these out, I’ve heard lots of good stuff about them, multi driver IEMs that punch above their price point and are great for bass? Yes please. Will do some digging as I’m sure people have upgraded the cables & tips on these.

Nice comparison video here of the 6 gauges of original Tortex picks. Go straight to 2:18 for the test. Strangely the green .88 is the only one he doesn’t give an opinion on at the end. Nothing earth-shattering, but good to hear them one after another. He does mention 1mm & 1.14 feeling like hard work, .50 being hard to control as it’s so thin, .60 giving a surprisingly good tone & it seems to be his fave along with the .73. I guess he doesn’t care much for the .88. I found some normal size greens I forgot about last week (I’ve used green triangles before but went off them) and have to say I was quite nonplussed about them. I guess the stiffness was a bit too much as I don’t mind the .88 Jim Dunlop Nylons. I’ve got some standard size yellow .73 to try since watching the video, so I guess there’ll be a tad more flex in them than the greens

Maybe I didn't miss the triangle shapes as much as I thought - the jury's still out on the Tortex Flex triangles. Since using mainly standard shape Jim Dunlop Nylons, I'm finding the triangles too bulky. I'll probably try the Tortex Flex in normal teardrop shape sometime and that will give me a better idea of how I rate the feel of these. I posted in here before that I don't feel the need to go below .88 or above 1mm, but 1mm feels too thick for me these days, and even .88 does at times as well. I'm gonna try a bunch of stuff that I already have and don't yet have, and attempt to find my sweet spot in terms of gauge, material, flex, feel, tone, etc. I know that even picks of a very similar (or even identical) gauge can feel very different, and can feel stiffer or more flexible than another pick that has the same number printed on it, but it should be a fun experiment anyway. I will most likely go as thin as .60, with .88 being the absolute top end of thickness regardless of the material. Somewhere within these boundaries I'm sure I'll find some picks that feel and sound great and don't make my hands ache. I'll also investigate the gauges that fall inbetween the 'standard' Dunlop sizes of .60, .73 & .88, for example the Dunlop Midi Nylons at .67 & .80, Clayton Black Ravens at .63 & .80, Fender Mediums at .71 and Herco Flex at .75. I've never been that keen on thick, rigid, stiff picks, I like to get some flex and the slight compressive effect that this brings, without going so thin that there's no 'authority' in striking the string, if you know what I mean. I like a reasonably good grip surface that doesn't wear off too quickly. I'm thinking that my sweet spot is likely to be somewhere between .60 & .80, but I'll see how it goes. It will give me something to do this Autumn / Winter anyway!

Ordered a mixed size set of Comply Foam 'Isolation Series 100 Core' tips. Like I said, I wanted to try a Shure SE black foam tip in medium (2 dot) but it looked like I had to buy a pack of 6 of them, which is rather silly if I find the size doesn't work for me. But then perhaps it's almost equally silly to buy a mixed size pack, to find I don't use the 2 sizes that don't fit as well as the 1 that does! Oh well, at least I'll be able to give each of the small, medium & large size foam tips a good go, whilst trying the Comply tips at the same time. Once I've figured out which size works best, I can just order a 3 pack of those when I need some more, in either Shure or Comply. Or I could get more for my money with Sonicfoams, I'm just not sure how good they'd be at those prices (10 sets for £14), in terms of isolation, fit & feel. I've been meaning to do this for ages, so I just did a comparison of silicone vs foam tips on both sets of Shures, and found as expected I far prefer foam tips. I'm not sure why I put up with silicone tips on my home earphones for so long, when I've been using foam tips on the church IEMs for some time. Silicone ones always feel like they want to slip out regardless of size, they come out so easily compared to foam, which just stays put much better. Foam gives a better seal, I don't need to keep pushing them back into place like I do with silicone, and everything just sounds much fuller because the seal is improved. As part of the test, I deliberately tried to gently pull them out of my ears, just the slightest tug on them and the silicone ones were out, whereas there was some resistance from the foam, they simply wanted to stay put. Also I dislike how tiny the sound hole (not sure if there's a more technical name for this!) is on the silicone tips, particularly on the grey Shure ones. The other thing I did during the test was to move my head & jaw about a bit (kind of replicating the head movements of when I play music through earphones lying down in bed) . . . the seal on the silicones was either loosened considerably or they simply popped right out, and again the foam ones stayed put. One of my absolute pet hates is how silicone tips are always coming loose if I try and listen to music late at night in bed, I end up giving up after a few songs as it totally spoils my enjoyment when the sound goes mega thin because the seal is broken. I saw no reason after this test to ever bother with the round silicone tips again and have thrown them out. Maybe one day I'll try the triple flange silicones, but for now I'm happy with foam tips.

Sorry, don't mean to take over the thread today, but I figure this stuff is helpful for any of us who use IEMs anyway. I just realised that I've been using the medium silicone tips on my SE112 for home listening (and large foam for SE215 at church), it's a shame that the SE215 set doesn't include the 2 dot medium size foam tip as I'd like to try a foam one in that size, and I can't seem to find anywhere to buy a single set of those to try, only £20 for 3 sets. I'm quite happy with the Shure foam tips though and can't imagine wanting to use round silicone ones again. I might try the triple flange 'christmas tree' silicone ones though, but I'd prefer them to be any colour but white, which the Shure ones are. I've read that the 'Comply Foam' tips are good for IEMs. I just perused their UK site and these are the recommended tips for Shure SE, that would work on both my 215 & 112 sets: Isolation Series - 200 Core, £15 Isolation Series - 100 Core, £20 Comfort Series - 100 Core, £20 Professional Series (P), £18 All prices are for 3 sets of tips. Can anyone particularly recommend any of those? They are about the same price as the Shure SE ones, except probably cheaper overall as Comply Foam says they offer free UK postage. I see there is also the Sonicfoam SF3 to fit both Shure sets, these are £14 for 10 sets, good value but almost seems too cheap. Can anyone vouch for these? I can't wait to ditch round silicone tips on my SE112 home set, I used to love listening to music late at night through earphones, then got increasingly annoyed with silicone buds working loose & sound escaping because of not getting a good seal, to the point where I hardly ever play music through earphones in bed anymore, but I'd like to do it more if I can sort through these issues. Thanks.

Thanks. I only play 4 strings anyway. The SE215 can distort the bass at times if I dig in, I need to keep the Tone Hammer DI tamed somewhat to keep things under control. We have an electronic drum kit, which the drummers don't like much at all, I think for what it is, it's a reasonably good one and probably quite expensive, but there's nothing like a proper acoustic drum kit. We've had all sorts of issues with the electronic kit - swapping cables in and out to troubleshoot faults, guest drummer uses kit & changes all the sounds, then regular drummers have to fiddle about to get a sound they like, etc. It brings a mountain of problems compared to the simplicity of a real kit. The only advantage I sort of get with the rubber pad kit is the ability to manage the volume of it, but just stick a proper kit in a booth and it should solve that anyway. I'm not a drum expert but I think there's misconception amongst a lot of church goers, pastors, etc, that drums are LOUD, 100% of the time, and it's most certainly not the case, if you factor in drummers not just using sticks but the likes of brushes, hot rods, etc, volume can always be tamed for the gentler stuff anyway. And for the louder stuff, well that's what screens / booths are for. Anyway, that's another issue entirely, but boy do I miss playing with a real kit. Thanks for the KZ ZS10 Pro recommendation. Did you or any of your team upgrade the cable, foam tips, etc? Thanks for this. It's funny, I've had the foam tips on my SE215 from the start as I gathered they were better for fit, feel & isolation, yet I've stuck with the standard round silicone tips for my own listening at home, which I do on Shure SE112 earphones. These entry level Shure earphones are way better than any Sennheisers I've had at a similar price, but not as good as the SE215 as you'd expect - they are half the price. We generally keep our SE215s in a box at church - we were encouraged to do that when we went IEM, I guess so nobody could turn up then say that they'd forgotten to bring them, and/or so people wouldn't wear them out using them a lot at home when the church had paid for them. Now I mostly do take mine home, but only to help with bass practice as I can plug them into my practice amp. I never forget to bring them to church as they're always in my backpack with my pedalboard & cables, etc. I'd get a set of SE215 for my home listening if I thought they were more reliable, but having seen 2 sets have an earbud crap out, I couldn't keep throwing another £100 at home earphones every time that happens, so I make do with the SE112. Back to the earphone tips - I've always felt that the round silicone ones want to slip out regardless of me trying different sizes, are never that comfy, and don't offer much isolation. I've got a bag full of spare round silicone tips from various Sony & Sennheiser earphones I've had over the years, but I'm really going off them having used foam tips in the Shure SE215 IEMs. I will definitely try the foam tips on my SE112 for home listening. Then I'll probably throw out all my spare silicone tips. That said, I'd be interested in trying the triple / christmas tree silicone tips you mention. I've never tried them. I know what you mean with fighting foam if you're taking them in and out a bit. Our worship leader will deliberately speak into the mic during practice so we don't have to remove our earbuds, but if anyone else around you in the band or a random person nearby wants to take to me, I have to take them out which is pretty annoying. Is there a particular triple silicone tip you can recommend, that fits with both Shure & KZ ZS10 Pro? I plugged in my SE215 at home earlier and the right earbud is definitely cutting out, so I can rule out the 3.5mm earphones to mixer cable anyway, though I do think we should upgrade these at some point. I'll mention it to the sound guys and see if I can have a new set, or see if I can talk them into getting me a set of KZ ZS10 Pro for half the price. I think the SE215 sound pretty good, but for £100+ I'd expect them to be more durable. I went to try the different foam tip sizes earlier (I've always used the large ones), and mistakenly thought I'd mislaid the medium (2 dot) size ones, looking at the contents it appears they come with S, M & L sizes in silicone, but strangely only Small (1 dot) and Large (3 dot) in foam, so no chance to try the Medium (2 dot) in foam. Might try and find some online, as going from large to small seems like one extreme to the other - though I do prefer the small to the large, I'd like to at least try the medium.

Yesterday the right earpiece of my Shure SE215 was crackling & cutting out frequently so badly in the very first song that I ended up pulling both ears out and they stayed out for the remainder of the service, as I understands it’s not good to have one earpiece in and one out. It was extremely weird to hear only the room sound through the main room speakers & subs facing away from me (silent stage) especially when some people in congregation would come in at the wrong time, like start singing a line too early. Also the volume was pretty crazy. It doesn’t seem that loud when I’m out there as 250+ voices kind of absorb everything, but up on the platform everything is so loud with my ears out. I’ll have to do some testing to figure out if it’s the earpiece itself, the earphones cable, or the male to female 3.5mm cable that we plug the earphone cable into to connect to the personal mixers. It’s incredibly annoying as on my last set of SE215 it was the left ear that crapped out. They’d had a good bit of use to be fair, but this set that replaced them isn’t even that old. I could try to find out if they’re under warranty, but I suspect it was from a bulk order the church did a few years ago. Whilst I’m doing some testing of them I plan to try the different size foam buds, as I’ve only ever used the largest 3 dot one. Has anyone else had issues with SE215 letting them down? Also I wonder if the fact we use cheap 3.5mm cables to go to the personal mixers doesn’t help. We use ‘Amazon Basics’ ones which I’m not sure is the best idea. There must be better ones out there, only recently I got the sound guy to replace mine as I was getting a hiss cutting in and out which went as soon as that cable was changed. Any recommendations for good quality 3.5mm male to female cables for this purpose? Thanks I’m tempted to try the KZ ZS10 Pro IEM as I believe it’s great for bass for the price (around £50) and is multi driver. I suspect it could still end up costing more as I’ve read that some have upgraded the cable and/or foam tips on these. Still cheaper than Shure’s multi driver IEMs though. Would appreciate any thoughts on this.

Phil bought a Precision bass from me, paid up quickly and was great to deal with throughout. A credit to Basschat.

Many thanks to @ped for sending me some of said BC strap blocks. I'll try them out, as well as some loud Ernie Ball lime green ones I've ordered. These Litorange 'Grolshlocks' look fantastic, good value for money too. Made of silicone, so I guess stretch easily to go over the strap button. I may end up trying these too. Thanks for the suggestions everyone.