TRN-STM Review (1) – The Devil Wears Lucite
Call us jaded, but requests to review <$30 Chinese earphones are generally met with a singular lack of enthusiasm around these parts, especially since upstarts like TRN are churning out barely-differentiated models faster than my wife generates traffic tickets. Certainly, nothing about the $23 TRN-STM’s appearance got me excited—generic cheap cable (albeit with a nice L-shaped connector) and dowdy-looking plastic and metal headshells which look a great deal like their KZ ZS and CCA competitors (In fairness, the teardrop design is very ergonomic and provides for excellent fit and isolation). Behold my glee, then, when I found two sets of interchangeable tuning nozzles at the bottom of the box. Tuning nozzles are, of course, the audio geek’s equivalent of crystal meth.
Rather than following the current trend of jamming 18 cheap drivers into a shell, the TRN-STM goes old school with a single (30019) BA and a 10mm DD; as a result it’s a lot more coherent than many of its budget peers. Crossover from low end to mids is essentially inaudible. The TRN-STM is very easy to drive and didn’t benefit notable from amping.
With the default (gold) nozzles, the TRN-STM immediately register as a loud, energetic and very bright V-shape, with substantially enhanced subbass (at near-basshead levels) and crisp, highly extended treble. Bass is deep (lower and more voluminous than the V80 or the V90, for example), and well controlled, with considerable texture and good speed. Mids are somewhat recessed, as if the performers are a few feet from front-stage, but full-sounding, while treble is very detailed, lean-bodied and sparkly; it’s not strident exactly, but not at all rounded or smoothed over, and treble-averse folks would find these too hot.
The red nozzles transform the sound significantly to a more balanced, mid-forward presentation—midbass is toned down a bit, though subbass is still full and present, while vocals (especially female) move to the front of the mix. They don’t rock as hard as the gold nozzles, but were better suited to tamer genres. The blue nozzles can be described as “vivid” or less politely as “reverse L-shaped treble cannon”—they similarly tone down low end and wildly accenuate the high end to emphasize upper frequencies and bring out even more micro-detail, but are over-pixilated and sharp to the point of exhaustion—there’s simply too much musical information.
In any permutation, the TRN-STM excels at a couple of things. First, it presents a surprisingly wide, deep soundstage, albeit with limited height— with excellent stereo separation and beyond-the-speakers imaging, it rivals the best KZs for sheer spread and instrument placement. Second, it does an absolutely uncanny job of reproducing drums—every snap, pound and cymbal is captured with precision, and attack transients are very fast.
So what’s the catch? Well, timbre is not the TRN-STM’s strong suit—like the recent KZ hybrids it’s ballsy and revealing, but excessively brilliant and somewhat over-etched; compared to something like the Blon BL-03 or BQEYZ KC-2, not to mention TRN’s $75 VX, the TRN-TM (like its predecessor, the V80) sounds a bit harsh and artificial, especially on brass instruments and with the red or blue filters. In this regard, the TRN-STM hews very close in character and quality to the ($30) KBear KB04, which is similarly bright, lively and hyper-detailed, though not paragons of naturalness. Yet while “technically” superior models like the Blon are truer to the source and ultimately less fatiguing, I’d likely find myself reaching for the STM (or for that matter, for the KB04) more often—it’s less fussy with source and more fun overall.
Finding absurdly cheap models like the TRN-STM are precisely what makes this obsession enjoyable—they’re colored as hell and purists may shudder, but give me that caffeine buzz are recommended nonetheless.
SPECIFICATIONS
Driver Configurations -10mm dual-magnet dynamic driver -30019 balanced armatures
Impedance 24 Ω
Sensitivity 106 dB/mW
Frequency range 20-20000 Hz
Cable Length 1.25m
Earphone interface 2Pin 0.75 mm interface
Tested at $23
MY VERDICT
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DISCLAIMER
These were provided free for review purposes by TRN and not by Linsoul.
Get the TRN-STM at Wooeasy Earphones Store.
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