Sherwood is not a new name in the world of audio. They have been a popular manufacturer of Audio Receivers for some time and they had products ranging from the entry level to the high end category.
When they decided to enter into the IEM world they had two options. One was to piggy back on some existing IEM manufacturer by stamping their name on an existing IEM, inflating the price and selling it to buyers with the Sherwood brand name. The other (the more difficult and costly option) was to build an IEM themselves by matching a driver with a suitable housing and tune the housing/driver till they achieved the desired sound signature.
Sherwood decided to choose the latter route and built an IEM from the ground up. The type of driver chosen for the Sherwoods also deserves a mention. They use a rare type of Balanced Amarture driver called a Siren Balanced Amarture. A few other earphones use this type of driver - qJays, Soundmagic PL-50 and others. These drivers are generally found on low end IEMs and considering the price point of the Sherwoods, the SE-777 is the most expensive of IEMs that use this Siren Balanced Armatures. Without going into technicalities, balanced armatures are generally considered to have faster transient response compared to Dynamic drivers and balanced armatures have been for ages used in the flagship IEMs of many brands like Shure, Etymotic Ears, Westone etc. However we now see quite a few top tier dynamic driver IEMs like the Sennheiser IE8, JVC FX700 and the Sony E1000. Dynamics generally are characterised by being 'slower' than Balanced armature IEMs but generally have more powerful bass that can hit lower and also a single dynamic driver can cater to the entire sonic spectrum. In the case of Balanced armature's a single driver generally has to compromise on either the bass or the treble and thats why the best balanced armature based IEMs offer two, three, or upto 8 balanced armature drivers in as single IEM !
Siren Balanced Armatures resemble dynamic drivers much more than balanced armatures and offer the similar full bodied sound that a good dynamic driver is capable off. So I was interested to see whether Sherwoods gamble of using a different driver paid off.
Now at the price that the Sherwoods are selling they have pretty stiff competition from the likes of Hifiman RE0, RE1, Brainwavz M3, Klipsch S4 and many other brands not currently available in India.
Packaging and Accessories
The packaging is very premium and the box can be opened up without any siccors.
Inside the box is the earphones themselves and a hard case with a cable winder inside along with the mandatory tips.
There are 3 single flange tips and 1 biflange tip. The bundled tips are unique to Sherwood but as always you can always use other tips like the Sony hybrids and the Head-direct biflange tips.
Build quality and comfort
The build quality was very good and quite reassuring. The cable was also very nice with little memory effect and microphonics were very low even when worn straight down.
Spec
Driver: Balanced Armature
Noise Isolation: -26dB
Frequency Response: 20Hz - 20kHz
Impedance: 53 ohm
Sensitivity: 105dB SPL/mW @ 1kHz
Cable: 1.2m
Weight: 31g
3.5mm gold plated mini plug
Sound
They were burned in for about 25 hours before reviewing and I found very little (if any) changes in the sound during that time so they do not require any significant burn-in time to sound their best.
My test setup was either my BlackBerry phone and my Music Streamer II DAC (connected directly w/o any amping). Both sources drove the Sherwoods pretty well with plenty of volume. However I found that the Sherwoods are one of the rare IEMs that gain some benefit by amping. Thankfully unlike the RE1 that also benefits from amping the Sherwoods sound great even without an amp. Its just that adding an amp moves then a notch up in the bass department and the dynamics. If you listen to a lot of slow music you won't easily tell the difference.
Most IEMs in this price range generally have one maybe two stand outs and one or two flaws. For instance the Hifiman Re0 has the best treble in its price range but mids and bass are lacking. Similarly the Hifiman Re1 has an amazing midrange and soundstage but falls short of offering an accurate bass and treble response.
The Sherwoods are one of the rare exceptions at this price point to offer a fairly neutral IEM with no shortcomings. The overall tonality is towards the mids but to say they are a mid centric IEM is not correct and unlike the RE1 which IS a mid centric IEM, the Sherwoods are capable of producing some very decent treble and bass.
Bass – The bass is very linear in nature which means it has decent amount of sub bass but does not exaggerate the bass by producing a mid range hump. This means that while the bass has good impact and depth they will not excite any ardent bass head. For the vast majority the Sherwoods offer enough bass to satisfy by offering better quality and quantity of bass than say a RE1 or RE0. It won't match the Brainwavz M2 but competes with the Brainwavz M3 quite nicely offering greater sub bass but lesser mid bass. So in songs that do not call for any bass you wont hear any bass from the Sherwoods.
Mids - Mids are a bit forward but not enough to consider the Sherwoods a mid centric IEM. The mids are smooth with a hint of lushness but they are not overtly lush like the RE1. They have a bit of texture that prevents them from sounding overtly smooth like the RE1. Overall the mids are definitely the focus of the sound and they don't disappoint
Treble – The treble is well done in the sense that its well extended with no harshness or sibilance though its slightly grainy and not very smooth. Now the treble is not the strongest point of the Sherwoods but they beat both the Brainwavz M3 and the RE1 in treble performance by a fair margin which is a very good thing.
Soundstage - The Sherwood offers a realistic soundstage with no major weakness.
The overall sound is quite neutral with a slight mid emphasis. This makes them suitable for most genres of music.
Compared to it immediate peers at its price point it does not have any wow factors like the Hifiman RE1 soundstage or the Hifiman RE1 treble or even the Hippo VBs bass but neither does it suffer from any weekness like anemic bass, harsh treble or even a bad build quality.
The Sherwoods earn my thumbs up for offering superb VFM at its price point of 3600 bucks (for TE members only). And to put my money where my mouth is, I am going to buy my review sample loaned by Gautam from Pristine Note.
