Satin is a super fun IEM with a very natural, lush timbre and fantastic technical abilities, but is not an analytical IEM at all. It is, first and foremost, a tremendous musical IEM. It does instruments like no other. But of all the IEMs I’ve heard, Satin does guitar, acoustic bass, congas and timbales like no other.
The bone conduction doesn’t go too far like it does on other IEMs. You feel the deep impact of the bass, but it doesn’t rumble your bones. It’s all very balanced. I like that the bone conduction driver has all the cool effects but does not rattle my brain. It is superbly implemented. The bass extension and depth are incredible and hit with tremendous texture, clarity and resolution.
It's the beautiful harmonics, note weight and extension of the instrument notes that, to me, stand out. Guitars, acoustic bass, drums, percussion, horns, piano all sound so full and realistic. Vocals are presented with great force and clarity, but without brightness, and are never shouty.
The soundstage is really wide and spacious, like a concert hall. Imaging is excellent and all instruments can be easily placed on the stage. Really sounds live, especially with jazz.
What makes Quill Satin so special is its incredibly balanced presentation and its rather unique scalability. Most high end gear scales well, but not all sets are as sensitive to both cable and source as Satin. Each cable change sounds like a different IEM. This quality allows each owner to fine tune Satin to their own preferences, making it quite the chameleon. During my exploration period, I bought a few cables that I plan to keep so that I can have different flavors for various moods and/or genres of music.
If you have not tried Quill Satin, I highly recommend giving it a try.
Here's a link to my review on HeadFi:
https://www.head-fi.org/showcase/quill-acoustics-satin.28190/reviews#review-38364
Photos: left (EA Fusion 1); right (PlusSound Quad Copper 8W)
