Performance

We had the earphones cooking for 150 hours in our burn-in rig before we gave them a serious listen. The manufacturer suggests that you burn them in for 100 hours. We only noticed a slight change in sound from 0 to 150 hours so the effects are not huge.

The sound of the M1s is quite a bit different from the M2s, but not necessarily in a bad way. The sound signature of the M1s is leaner and more balanced when compared to the M2s. They completely lack the bass hump that made the M2s such a good pick for people looking for a bass heavy set of in-ears. To these ears the M1s sound like a set of slightly bassier Head-Direct RE2s with a bit less control from the mid to the high range. Their sound signature is more forgiving and the added warmth and less upper midrange sparkle makes them less sensitive to bad sibilant mastering than the RE2s. They are not as warm or have the same control throughout the range as the more expensive Sunrise SW-Xcape, but they do put up a good fight price considered.


The earphones were tested on the following rigs: Cowon D2, HiFiMAN HM-801 (standard amplifier module and GAME Module) and via line out to FiiO E1/E5 and RSA Tomahawk, and last but not least on the iPhone 4. The M1 in-ears are just as easy to drive as its bigger brother the M2. We were able to power them to good results on all of the above mentioned players. Due to the lack of coloration they did exhibit slightly better synergy with the warmer sounding setups. Compared to a set of Sennheiser CX300s or Creative EP630 these in-ears have a leaner sound, but what they lack in bass they make up for in detail. The M1s are just a tad more resolving than the CX300s which makes them great for people looking for a less colored presentation.

Microphonic disturbance from the cable is just like that of the M2 in-ears. When used with the supplied cable clip the amount is bearable, but the M1s are definitely not the most silent in this regard. Noise attenuation wise these perform slightly worse than the M2s. They provide roughly the same amount of attenuation as the RE-series in-ears from Head-Direct which is good enough for normal commuting. For airplane travel we would prefer something that blocks out more unwanted noise.

Durability

The M1s seem very well constructed. The simple design and well put together shell means that these will take quite a beating before falling to pieces. The cable is also one of the best we have ever seen on a set of $40 in-ears.