Introduction:
I've been looking for a new pair of IEMs to add to the UE Superfi 3 I have and when I saw mediahome.in had started importing the PL30s I was keen to check them out.
Got in touch with them and they were kind enough to send me a review sample, which for the record, I've been glued to for the past week or so!
[BREAK=The Packaging]
The SoundMagic PL 30 came packed in a boxboard box, with clean silver etched printing. The small cloth strip that assists you in opening the box is an excellent addition and immediately reminds you about the ‘premium’ segment of these earphones.
The packaging is well organized and there are enough compartments for the earphones and accessories to fit in. A MAJOR gripe I have with most IEM casings is that they are so small that once opened its nearly impossible to repack without squeezing the stuff back in. However this is not the case with the PL30, the box has ample space for you to store all the provided accessories and even a tiny little cloth for cleaning the eartips can be tucked in neatly.
[BREAK=Build / Accessories]
Getting down to the IEMs itself. They are pretty compact compared to the other IEMs I’ve used before. The cable provided with the IEMs is long enough for a tall guy like me (6’2â€) to drop the mp3 player into my trouser pocket without any hassles. The shirt clip provided is also useful for routing the cable, which eliminates the mess caused by tangled wires.
The earphones themselves feel nice and solid with blue and red tags around them to distinguish between left and right respectively. There’s also a plastic chrome strip running around them that enhances the look. The PL30 looks stylish yet it’s not full of bling that attracts unnecessary attention.
The bass adjust knobs found on both earplugs feel solid and are very well built. They are a bit firm to adjust but that is ostensibly to prevent any unwanted movements.
The cable has a nice rubber feel to it and the gold plated 3.5mm jack is a reminder that these are SoundMagic’s premium IEMs.
SoundMagic can however do with better finishing and a more informative user manual that has more detailed information on how to wear the IEMs and some technical specifications like driver size and rated output/distortion. A two page user manual is certainly not expected and it’s a big downer cause it took me some time to figure out how to fit the IEMs correctly.
Also you will initially feel disappointed at the quality of finish on the tips, rubber ear clips and the IEMs themselves but all that is easily forgotten once you switch them on.
[BREAK=Audio Quality]
The first thing that you realise immediately when you fire the IEMs up is the HUGE and I mean really huge soundstage. This is very unusual for IEMs to be honest and even my Ultimate Ears Super.fi 3 don’t deliver such an in-your face front row experience. They are also very high volume earphones thereby eliminating the need for any sort of amplification whether you’re using a computer, cellphone or even a tiny mp3 player.
The PL30s sounded decent out of the box, though they sounded a lot better after about a 15-hour burn-in. I’ve reviewed the PL30s with the ‘Bass Adjust’ knob set to the minimum position. This is because I found the bass started cracking and got very muddy at higher positions. However, don’t be fooled by the low setting, the PL30 delivers enough bass to knock your socks off. The bass is a little slow to hit but it has a lot of depth and reach, something that is again not characteristic of IEMs. The PL30 has a wonderful drive and the synthesizer swells in Filterheadz’s A Day at the Beach sounded wonderfully melodic and the bass added more completeness and drive, making you literally feel every note played out.
The highs are clean and are very well controlled so that you don’t have to keep rubbing yours ears after a long listening session. Though I could make out slight hints of sibilance in Zara’s vocals when playing out Roger Shah’s Lost, overall they sound very quick and crisp.
The treble sounds fresh and warm but is not as bright as I’d like it to be and sometimes in the middle of tracks I felt that key mid range elements like vocals and rhythm guitars were drowned amidst the percussion and bass heavy instruments. I noticed this particularly with Thom Yorke’s vocals in Radiohead’s 2+2 = 5. The situation did not improve as the earphones burned in since the highs got sharper as they opened up and the bass harder and I had to reach for the EQ on my amp at least twice in a listening space of 10 tracks.
Detailing is sharp and the PL30 picks a lot more than you’d expect it to. The strumming on the strings in John Mayer’s Your Body is a Wonderland, Klaus Meine’s gentle whistling on Scorpions’ Winds of Change and the sweet flanged psychedelic guitar on Pink Floyd’s Another Brick in the Wall were all beautifully reproduced by the PL30 with detail levels that I would expect only my Beyerdynamic DT770 Pro to deliver.
Summing things up, I would describe the PL30’s sound to be bright, very driving with tight bass, slightly laidback treble and lush, liquid highs.
A point I’d like to make however is that certain stereo effects cannot be achieved in earphones since IEMs place the soundstage inside your head. Thus your auditory reference point is very close to the point of recording as such and it fails to give you a correct stereo image. Thus it is incorrect for one to compare the stereo image produced by IEMs with that produced by a set of speakers.
This is basically known as Head Related Transfer Function and must be kept in mind while forming your own judgement with respect to imaging when you listen to the IEMs.
Also due to diffraction and reflection inside the head and pinneae, there are high non-linear variations of frequency response as perceived by the human ear. SoundMagic has done a remarkable job of achieving a very pleasing frequency response and the PL30 sound very smooth and deliver enough over the entire spectrum to keep everybody happy and involved.
[BREAK=Noise Isolation]
5.30pm on Mumbai’s Western Express highway, jammed to the core with four lanes of traffic on either side, drivers using their vehicle horns as if it’s the last day the horns will work. With nothing playing out of my iPod, I could hear just low growls of the horns of larger vehicles close to me. The PL30 took off all the mids, highs and screeches from the traffic noise. I would have ideally loved to compare these to the Etymotic Research ER-20 earplugs I use while clubbing but I didn’t have them with me, DOH.
Once I turned once the music, everything was gone. I could hear very little honking and engine noise during quieter parts of the track but once the drums were back in, they just submerged all possible ambient noises.
Same goes for the aircraft test. I plugged them in while the aircraft was taxiing and didn’t turn on the music till the aircraft was just about to lift off. Very impressive results again! The PL30 did a brilliant job suppressing the noise generated by the Airbus A320’s twin engines and as I turned up the volume only the not-so-pretty airhostesses passing by reminded me that I was still on an airplane.
Overall I’m VERY satisfied with the noise isolation abilities of the SoundMagic PL30 and I think they’re definitely right up there with $200 IEMs like the M-Audio IE-20 I’ve tested earlier.
Please note however noise isolation depends largely on fit of the earphones and this means that you need to be very careful in choosing the right eartips for your ears. I’d highly recommend you try out at least 4 different eartips before deciding on the one that fits your ears best. Sometimes one size smaller or larger can sound a whole lot better!
Also note that ears sizes can be different. A very close friend of mine uses a large size on his left ear and a medium on his right ear. So if you find that one ear is properly sealed and the other is not, don’t hesitate to keep trying different sizes till your satisfied that both ears are properly sealed.
[BREAK=Conclusions]
The SoundMagic PL30 is a very attractive package irrespective of the price and I think at a price of point of around Rs. 1500 the deal gets even sweeter. I am all praise for the IEMs and I’ve been consistently picking them over the UE Super.fi 3 for the past week or so. In fact I’m liking them so much at the moment that I also use them for a second opinion in the studio after the Beyer 770.
The Noise Isolation (if sealed well!) is also brilliant and I’d highly recommend it to people who use their mp3 players extensively while traveling, be it a bike, a train or an airplane.
Here are a few numbers to simplify the review:
Sound Quality – 3.5/5
Noise Isolation – 4/5
Build – 3/5
Comfort – 4/5
Value for Money – 4.5/5
Overall – 4/5
Thanks to Anuj from Mediahome.in for providing me with a pair to review. You can buy the SoundMagic PL30 by clicking here with a 1-year warranty provided exclusively in India by Mediahome.in
Some more pictures here:
I've been looking for a new pair of IEMs to add to the UE Superfi 3 I have and when I saw mediahome.in had started importing the PL30s I was keen to check them out.
Got in touch with them and they were kind enough to send me a review sample, which for the record, I've been glued to for the past week or so!
[BREAK=The Packaging]
The SoundMagic PL 30 came packed in a boxboard box, with clean silver etched printing. The small cloth strip that assists you in opening the box is an excellent addition and immediately reminds you about the ‘premium’ segment of these earphones.
The packaging is well organized and there are enough compartments for the earphones and accessories to fit in. A MAJOR gripe I have with most IEM casings is that they are so small that once opened its nearly impossible to repack without squeezing the stuff back in. However this is not the case with the PL30, the box has ample space for you to store all the provided accessories and even a tiny little cloth for cleaning the eartips can be tucked in neatly.
[BREAK=Build / Accessories]
Getting down to the IEMs itself. They are pretty compact compared to the other IEMs I’ve used before. The cable provided with the IEMs is long enough for a tall guy like me (6’2â€) to drop the mp3 player into my trouser pocket without any hassles. The shirt clip provided is also useful for routing the cable, which eliminates the mess caused by tangled wires.
The earphones themselves feel nice and solid with blue and red tags around them to distinguish between left and right respectively. There’s also a plastic chrome strip running around them that enhances the look. The PL30 looks stylish yet it’s not full of bling that attracts unnecessary attention.
The bass adjust knobs found on both earplugs feel solid and are very well built. They are a bit firm to adjust but that is ostensibly to prevent any unwanted movements.
The cable has a nice rubber feel to it and the gold plated 3.5mm jack is a reminder that these are SoundMagic’s premium IEMs.
SoundMagic can however do with better finishing and a more informative user manual that has more detailed information on how to wear the IEMs and some technical specifications like driver size and rated output/distortion. A two page user manual is certainly not expected and it’s a big downer cause it took me some time to figure out how to fit the IEMs correctly.
Also you will initially feel disappointed at the quality of finish on the tips, rubber ear clips and the IEMs themselves but all that is easily forgotten once you switch them on.
[BREAK=Audio Quality]
The first thing that you realise immediately when you fire the IEMs up is the HUGE and I mean really huge soundstage. This is very unusual for IEMs to be honest and even my Ultimate Ears Super.fi 3 don’t deliver such an in-your face front row experience. They are also very high volume earphones thereby eliminating the need for any sort of amplification whether you’re using a computer, cellphone or even a tiny mp3 player.
The PL30s sounded decent out of the box, though they sounded a lot better after about a 15-hour burn-in. I’ve reviewed the PL30s with the ‘Bass Adjust’ knob set to the minimum position. This is because I found the bass started cracking and got very muddy at higher positions. However, don’t be fooled by the low setting, the PL30 delivers enough bass to knock your socks off. The bass is a little slow to hit but it has a lot of depth and reach, something that is again not characteristic of IEMs. The PL30 has a wonderful drive and the synthesizer swells in Filterheadz’s A Day at the Beach sounded wonderfully melodic and the bass added more completeness and drive, making you literally feel every note played out.
The highs are clean and are very well controlled so that you don’t have to keep rubbing yours ears after a long listening session. Though I could make out slight hints of sibilance in Zara’s vocals when playing out Roger Shah’s Lost, overall they sound very quick and crisp.
The treble sounds fresh and warm but is not as bright as I’d like it to be and sometimes in the middle of tracks I felt that key mid range elements like vocals and rhythm guitars were drowned amidst the percussion and bass heavy instruments. I noticed this particularly with Thom Yorke’s vocals in Radiohead’s 2+2 = 5. The situation did not improve as the earphones burned in since the highs got sharper as they opened up and the bass harder and I had to reach for the EQ on my amp at least twice in a listening space of 10 tracks.
Detailing is sharp and the PL30 picks a lot more than you’d expect it to. The strumming on the strings in John Mayer’s Your Body is a Wonderland, Klaus Meine’s gentle whistling on Scorpions’ Winds of Change and the sweet flanged psychedelic guitar on Pink Floyd’s Another Brick in the Wall were all beautifully reproduced by the PL30 with detail levels that I would expect only my Beyerdynamic DT770 Pro to deliver.
Summing things up, I would describe the PL30’s sound to be bright, very driving with tight bass, slightly laidback treble and lush, liquid highs.
A point I’d like to make however is that certain stereo effects cannot be achieved in earphones since IEMs place the soundstage inside your head. Thus your auditory reference point is very close to the point of recording as such and it fails to give you a correct stereo image. Thus it is incorrect for one to compare the stereo image produced by IEMs with that produced by a set of speakers.
This is basically known as Head Related Transfer Function and must be kept in mind while forming your own judgement with respect to imaging when you listen to the IEMs.
Also due to diffraction and reflection inside the head and pinneae, there are high non-linear variations of frequency response as perceived by the human ear. SoundMagic has done a remarkable job of achieving a very pleasing frequency response and the PL30 sound very smooth and deliver enough over the entire spectrum to keep everybody happy and involved.
[BREAK=Noise Isolation]
5.30pm on Mumbai’s Western Express highway, jammed to the core with four lanes of traffic on either side, drivers using their vehicle horns as if it’s the last day the horns will work. With nothing playing out of my iPod, I could hear just low growls of the horns of larger vehicles close to me. The PL30 took off all the mids, highs and screeches from the traffic noise. I would have ideally loved to compare these to the Etymotic Research ER-20 earplugs I use while clubbing but I didn’t have them with me, DOH.
Once I turned once the music, everything was gone. I could hear very little honking and engine noise during quieter parts of the track but once the drums were back in, they just submerged all possible ambient noises.
Same goes for the aircraft test. I plugged them in while the aircraft was taxiing and didn’t turn on the music till the aircraft was just about to lift off. Very impressive results again! The PL30 did a brilliant job suppressing the noise generated by the Airbus A320’s twin engines and as I turned up the volume only the not-so-pretty airhostesses passing by reminded me that I was still on an airplane.
Overall I’m VERY satisfied with the noise isolation abilities of the SoundMagic PL30 and I think they’re definitely right up there with $200 IEMs like the M-Audio IE-20 I’ve tested earlier.
Please note however noise isolation depends largely on fit of the earphones and this means that you need to be very careful in choosing the right eartips for your ears. I’d highly recommend you try out at least 4 different eartips before deciding on the one that fits your ears best. Sometimes one size smaller or larger can sound a whole lot better!
Also note that ears sizes can be different. A very close friend of mine uses a large size on his left ear and a medium on his right ear. So if you find that one ear is properly sealed and the other is not, don’t hesitate to keep trying different sizes till your satisfied that both ears are properly sealed.
[BREAK=Conclusions]
The SoundMagic PL30 is a very attractive package irrespective of the price and I think at a price of point of around Rs. 1500 the deal gets even sweeter. I am all praise for the IEMs and I’ve been consistently picking them over the UE Super.fi 3 for the past week or so. In fact I’m liking them so much at the moment that I also use them for a second opinion in the studio after the Beyer 770.
The Noise Isolation (if sealed well!) is also brilliant and I’d highly recommend it to people who use their mp3 players extensively while traveling, be it a bike, a train or an airplane.
Here are a few numbers to simplify the review:
Sound Quality – 3.5/5
Noise Isolation – 4/5
Build – 3/5
Comfort – 4/5
Value for Money – 4.5/5
Overall – 4/5
Thanks to Anuj from Mediahome.in for providing me with a pair to review. You can buy the SoundMagic PL30 by clicking here with a 1-year warranty provided exclusively in India by Mediahome.in
Some more pictures here:
the snaps are also very professional. keep it up Anish.:hap2:
