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Qudelix 5k dBSPL Estimate... huge variance from IEM to IEM (alien.top)

submitted 1 year ago by TURBO_SCROTUM@alien.top to c/headphones@hi-fi.community

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I know you are supposed to put in your output impedence and sensitivity per IEM.

For my Blessings 3 I put: 14.8 @ 120

For my Monarch MK3 I put: 18 @ 99

I get totally different results:

When listening to the Blessings 3 "loud enough" is around 100-105 dBSPL.

When listening to the Monarch MK3, "loud enough" is around 80-85 dBSPL.

The only thing I can think of that would cause this is that one of the manufacturers spec sheets is wrong? Moondrop lists a potential variance of +/-15% on the output impedence, but even with those adjustments it doesn't come close to what I'm hearing from the Monarch.

Any tips?

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[–] Regular-Cheetah-8095@alien.top 1 points 1 year ago

Their customer support has gone on record with it being pretty scattershot, just a ballpark estimate.

[–] LightBroom@alien.top 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The SPL calculation does not reflect reality and should be ignored mostly.

There was a thread on their forums for this exact issue and how displayed 100+ dB SPL felt like 75 dB SPL and their support wasn't very helpful.

They said it's maths done in a vacuum and that's pretty much it, it's not an actual measurement so just ignore it.

[–] TURBO_SCROTUM@alien.top 1 points 1 year ago

My guess is that whoever in their forums had this issue had a similar unit conversion issue as myself

[–] daballsman@alien.top 1 points 1 year ago

It basically doesn't work.

[–] iokislc@alien.top 1 points 1 year ago

Qudelix reports dB(Z) vs something like Apple AirPods via iOS that reports dB(A).