OEM Product Series: The Yuin Look alike

It was mentioned sometimes ago that we are going to release the OEM product series. It has to come with a BANG, so we hunted down this brand. For such a small company, it must have outsourced its production line to someone esle, some bigger factory. In the World’s factory, the production control is not as good, so products tend to “flow” out of the factory, or, the design is used or slightly tweaked for a different brand product.

Here we have something very familiar if you are into earphones. The PK2, selling at USD69 in the states.

Tell the difference!!

The exterior is almost 100% the same, except the X brand has grey color cap opposed to the PK2, and the cap is slightly thicker too. I think both are using the same molding, and if both can share the same molding technology, may be the sound driver too?

Material wise, I am VERY surprised, the X brand is made of superior quality material compared to the the Yuin, both the plastic and cable are real solid stuff.

The Sound Quality

To really test out the sound quality, we are driving this baby with RudiStor NX-33, I think it is good enough amplifier, the source is a Denon S10II.

Initial Impression with Ipod:

When I first got these earbuds, I was so excited, I have got something look exactly to the PK2. Plug into my Rockboxed ipod,  WOW! It sounds good! immediately I pass to my friends to let them try out. And we compared directly to the PK2 we have, and concluded that this bud has stronger bass, and it could be bright at times. May be need to burn in first?

After overnight burn-in, the sound is OK enough, so I did an AB comparison with PK2. Before doing that, I took a Fluke multimeter to measure the impedance of the sound driver of each earbud. The Pk2 measured at about 15.6 ohm, while the X brand at about 18.1 ohm. It seems like they are not using the same driver, what a disappoinment, however I am not sure about this, do not have a chance to open up yet.

The PK2 as usual, excel in producing the clear and crisp sound, but the soundstage and bass has room for improvement. In contrast, the X brand, its region bas is very promnent, yet preserves much of the detail. The mid is very good, I am not sure if there is a hump in mid frequency range, human voice and guitar tends to stand out.  However, the high is not as crisp as the PK2, may be overwhelmed by the bass. Another issue is the earphones tends to be bright at times if pairing with wrong equipment, as it quite revealing. Overall, it is definitely better than PK3, but has a quite different signature compared to PK2.

More Photos to share:

The truth is, this phone is not designed for normal earphone jack, and the connetor is slightly different, but the cable quality is solid!!

To really compare the cable quality between the X brand and the Yuin, i dissected them.

The X brand cable comes with 2 individual wire, shielded.

In contrast, the Yuin only has tiny strands of copper wire in the cable, that explains why it breaks easily.