On this overview, I’ll see what Maytak Audio brings to the desk with their M6 customized IEMs. They begin at $949.99 USD and upwards.
Disclaimer: Maytak Audio isn’t associated to Headfonia. They despatched me the Maytak Audio M6 freed from cost to be featured on Headfonia.com.
Maytak Audio
The corporate hails from South Carolina, USA and is presently a one-man present with Gene Maytak being the person. Gene has in depth expertise in professional audio and bought serious about IEMs to get some listening to safety in loud working environments. After discovering out that customized IEMs are made largely by hand, he determined to study what makes them tick and began taking them aside.
Quick ahead just a few years, and Maytak Audio is born with a spread of 4 customized IEMs. M2, M3, M4, and M6 are every named after the variety of drivers used within the building. All however the M2 use a 3-way digital crossover, and each IEM within the lineup employs completely balanced-armatures. All of them may be personalized to style or different necessities, and all share the identical fundamental set of equipment.
Maytak Audio M6
Because the title suggests, the Maytak Audio M6 is a six-driver customized IEM. All six are balanced armatures and work from 3 bands of electrically crossed-over alerts. It’s seemingly that the brunt of low-passing is finished by way of bodily filters within the nozzle, while high-passing is left for the digital filters. The M6 has three seen nozzles, which meet on the very tip proper behind the mesh grille.
Like many different IEMs, the M6 is vented, however on this case, we’re coping with a pinhole-sized gap, prone to alleviate insertion strain adjustments as a substitute of augmenting low-frequency output.
The M6 is kind of delicate at 133dB/V, nevertheless, the voltage sensitivity is inflated by the 11-ohm load impedance. Transformed to effectivity, we get a extra down-to-earth 113.4dB/mW determine, which implies that energy necessities are moderately meagre and nearly any sort of drive circuit will have the ability to present sufficient energy.
The excessive sensitivity determine does make the M6 fairly vulnerable to digital noise like hissing, AC hum, floor loops or digital noise from poor circuit isolation.
Options
- 6 balanced-armature vented shell acoustic system
- 3-way digital crossover
- 3 output ducts
- 3D-printed customized acrylic shell
- 10Hz-20kHz frequency response
- 11ohm impedance
- 113.4dB/mW effectivity
- 133dB/V sensitivity
- 0.78mm 2-pin recessed connectors
- 1.25m single crystal copper, 8-wire, spherical braid
- soldered 4.4mm jack
Design, Construct & Haptics
Casing
I respect that Maytak haven’t gone overboard with the unboxing with the M6. All we get is a smallish, plain cardboard field that homes the aluminum carrying case and a few minor paperwork. After all, low unbox remedy factors, however I don’t have to wonder if to throw out a kilo price of shiny cardboard and foam inserts.
The plain boxing additionally lets the client know that every one of their hard-earned money has gone into what issues.
The carrying case is substantial and made totally of anodized aluminum. The lid has the Maytak Audio brand laser-engraved on it and the proprietor’s nom de guerre beneath it. Not like the Timeless II case, the sound the lid makes when it’s unscrewed isn’t as grating, which my ears respect.
Contained in the case, we discover the M6 IEMs, a cleansing material, a brush software, and a shirt clip for the cable.
Construct High quality
The Maytak M6 makes use of 3D-printed acrylic for his or her ear shells with a few millimeters of shell thickness. This makes the IEMs fairly gentle, however I assume a full fill would make them really feel much less hole. In any case, my ears respect the sunshine weight. When configuring, the acrylic may be chosen to be totally translucent or opaque, like on my pair.
There are additionally quite a few choices for faceplates, and I selected an audiophile crowd favourite – maple burl, which appears completely fabulous in actual life as effectively. Does it imbue its woody qualities on the sound? Seemingly not…
I’ll say that the standard of the shell is impeccable, with no seen imperfections. The match can be nice as Gene personally examined the 3D recordsdata of my ear impressions. My audiologist didn’t have a biting block, so I wrapped my index and center fingers in a serviette and bit into these.
After all, the serviette was too skinny (or my enamel had been too highly effective!), and I ended up with two good chew marks on every of my palms. Now, don’t inform me I don’t go the additional mile for you!
Lastly, the cable. Lengthy story brief, it’s an everyday stage monitor cable. There’s zero microphonics, and it does a fantastic job of getting out of the way in which. On the similar time, it in all probability received’t enchantment to cable connoisseur sensibilities because it’s skinny and has zero bling.
The enter facet is terminated in 3.5mm TRS angled jack, so for something extra particular, you’d must supply your personal cable that helps recessed 2-pin connectors.
Consolation and Ergonomics
That is my first tango with customized IEMs, so my impressions might be relative to common IEMs. I’ll say that my ears needed to be accustomed to the deep insertion, however after a day, the Maytak M6 felt like I used to be carrying nothing. The match, after all, will rely upon the experience of your audiologist and on how carefully you’ve adopted the directions offered by Maytak Audio.
If one thing does go fallacious, I belief Gene to level it out by analyzing the impressions and giving useful suggestions.
Initially, I used to be underwhelmed by the cable that comes with the M6 because it’s fairly skinny and appears fairly un-audiophile. After just a few listening classes on-the-go, I grew to understand its non-existent microphonics and that it usually retains out of the way in which of me having fun with music.
I’ve encountered related cables from different pro-oriented manufacturers, so I can’t say that I used to be stunned to come across it right here. In order for you a flashier twine, simply order one thing with 2-pn connectors that may accommodate recessed plugs.
Isolation
Resulting from the truth that Maytak M6 use minimal venting and, like many different customized IEMs, go for a deeper insertion depth, the isolation is great. It’s not precisely as much as par with what you get from Etymotics, however total, it cuts out noise higher than most common vented shell IEMs.
The spectacular passive isolation provided by the Maytak M6 makes commuting and open-office work virtually noise-free and permits the IEMs to carry out subjectively higher because the signal-to-noise ratio is larger.
Sound Signature and Technicalities
My most important testing system for the Maytak M6 was the Topping x Holo Centuarus driving the DROP + SMSL HO150, Aune S17 Professional EVO, and two moveable rigs – the (trans)moveable iFi iDSD Valkyrie and the cheerful Snowsky Retro Nano.
Driving the Maytak M6 is moderately easy, with every part from a meagre 25$ dongle to having sufficient juice on faucet to attain loads of quantity. Care needs to be taken in regard to achieve – 133dB/V sensitivity implies that from hotter sources, you won’t have sufficient quantity management legroom and be relegated to the underside area, the place most conventional potentiometers can have the worst channel matching.
The comparatively excessive sensitivity additionally means the noisy sources might be simply revealed. While an 11-ohm load facilitates excessive voltage sensitivity, it additionally implies that the Maytak M6 are fairly delicate in direction of output impedance.
With loudspeakers, the rule of thumb is to maintain output impedance 8 occasions decrease than the load, so with the M6, this interprets to 1.4 ohms.
One should additionally take into account that these are multi-driver IEMs with non-linear electrical impedance, so excessive impedance drive will work together with them and trigger shifts within the frequency response.
Total, driving the Maytak M6 is a moderately simple affair if the above concerns are saved in thoughts. After all, while Snowsky Retro Nano had sufficient drive and was satisfying to take heed to, one thing higher-end just like the Valkyrie offered a palpable enchancment in virtually each facet.
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