At-a-glance
| PROs | CONs |
| Clean, agile overall presentation | Unmusical. Lack of personality. Gets better with some EQing. |
| Detail retrieval | Some coarse grain in the trebles |
| Instrument separation | Occasional light sibilance |
| Comfort | Cable |
| Ridiculous street price |
Full Device Card
Test setup
Hiby R5 – Single Ended port. Single flange silicone stock tips. Lossless 16/44.1 – 24/96 – 24/192 FLAC tracks.
Signature analysis
| Tonality | Open-V shape, with more emphasis on the trebles than the bass, while still not being a bright IEM at all. Clean, precise almost to the point of being analythical, not very musical at all… in short: it all lacks personality. | Sub-Bass | Very well extended, lean, fast (for a DD). Emphasized but not too much and for my taste not enough, and that’s it sole real con on my score. Should it raise another 3-4dB while keeping the same speed I could call it a masterpiece. |
| Mid Bass | Less elevated then sub-bass, fast too, moderately punchy, not boomy, rather lean instead, not ever bleeding on the mids. Well done (to my taste) |
| Mids | Moderately recessed. Definitely on the bright side, but without exhageration. |
| Male Vocals | Dry & lean (as in scarcely bodied). Amongst the least remarkable part of the product |
| Female Vocals | Much better than Males. Present, not lushy but not lean either, precise, detailed. Unfortunately some sibilance sometimes comes up. |
| Highs | Very well extended and not harsh. Clear, airy, very detailed. Sometimes grainier than it should be, and that’s not good but it’s just about its sole serious downside. |
Technicalities
| Soundstage | Not a monster here, yet not bad at all. Width is good, depth is at best average. |
| Imaging | Some odd choices (positions) come up at times, but that’s infrequent. Positioning is anyhow stable once set |
| Details | Very, very nice detail retrieval on the highs ! Definitely above average, probably even “good” details on the sub-bass too. A solid highlight on this model. |
| Instrument separation | Another P2 forte: instruments are well separated and the entire presentation is highly resolving. A really nice job has been done here. |
| Driveability | Easy to power, and not overly sensitive too. No worries even with a smartphone. |
Physicals
| Build | ABS, glossy black finish. Sturdyness is quite convincing. |
| Fit | Housings are cleverly accurately shaped to be freely L-R swappable (inverting cable connections) according to the user preferring cable-down or cable-over-ear wear. Housings are not big at all and their position within the concha is not univoque at all. With my ears, and using stock tips, it took quite a while to find the exact angle to obtain an appropriate and secure seal – yet, once done, the fit is quite stable. |
| Comfort | Superb. Housing size, shape, smooth surface and weight are just great. Wearing them for hours provokes no nuisance. |
| Isolation | Above average. The housings don’t seal the concha perfectly, “some” in-bound leak does happen, but absolute noise reduction is anyhow quite significant. |
| Cable | Nothing bad to highlight as for sound quality, but the TPE sheat is just infuriating: in spite of a nice to touch silky finish, it is too elastic (tends to sling back from my wanted position), and un-slidy. |
Specifications (declared)
| Housing | ABS, glossy black finish |
| Driver(s) | 10 mm moving coil (dynamic) with copper-clad aluminum voice coil |
| Connector | MMCX |
| Cable | Reinforced TPE jacket over oxygen-free copper (OFC) conductors, single ended, 3.5mm plug, with in-line MIC and remote |
| Sensitivity | 100±3 dB (1mW at 1KHZ) |
| Impedance | 16 Ohms at 1K |
| Frequency Range | 17 Hz to 20 kHz |
| Rated Power | – |
| Package / accessories | Audio cable with headset, shirt clip, silicone eartips (3 single-flange pairs, 2 dual-flange pairs, 1 triple-flange pair), Comply foam eartips (1 pair), carrying case, user manual |
| MSRP at this post time | $99,99 on manufacturer’s site. Often on sale below $30,00 on Drop or other sites. |
Subjective opinion and considerations
As I tried to convey on the Device Card, Pinnacle P2 is not a bad IEM at all. What is smells like, though, is of an “ordered homework carried out by a well educated schoolboy”: most of it is exact, some mistakes are there but no big deal, yet… how boring.
What can be done is to add some spice and personality. A super-simple EQ scheme like the following already changes the situation from night to day:
Lowshelf 80Hz 2.0dB Q:0.64Lowshelf 150Hz 4.5dB Q:1.10
This essentially elevates the sub-bass significantly leaving all the rest untouched. Such elevation does not deplete P2’s sub-bass goods (speed most of all) and – especially on some genres like rock or edm – radically changes the overall impact I get from the device. Yes trebles will still have some grainess too much but the entire impact is now much more emotional.
Lastly – yet far from unimportantly – P2’s MSRP is by and large wrong. The market around $100 is populated by quite other big calibres against which nice&polite P2 does not stand a chance, really. But the $30-ish special deal price frequently re-appearing on the market is a total game changer: in the sub-$30 bracket P2 becomes a very significant player.
Comparisons
| Pinnacle P2 | final E2000 | TIN T4 | |
| Driver(s) | Single Dynamic Driver | Single Dynamic Driver | Single Dynamic Driver |
| Tonality | Open-V shape, with a clair & bright taint | Open W-shape, personal quite musical timbre lacking 1% of spice to be more engaging | Slightly bright neutral, engaging dynamics |
| Bass | Extended, lean, fast sub-bass, lacking some critical elevation. Mildly elevated, fast, moderately punchy, rather lean, above average midbass. | Rolled off, but fast and clean subbass. Lightly elevated, tight and softly punchy – somewhat too timid – midbass | Modestly elevated mid and sub. Fast, clean. |
| Mids | Moderately recessed. Bright-ish. Too lean male, better (precise,detailed) female vocals | Full, rounded. Sound more prominent due to unexhalted bass. Good vocals | Clear, natural sounding and flat. |
| Highs | Well extended and not harsh. Clear, airy, detailed. Sometimes too grainy | Average extension, modestly airy. 6K peak adds some “sparkle”. No harshness | Clair, quite extended, well articulated. Excessive at times. Unfrequent light sibilance removed by tips or deeper insertion. |
| Soundstage | Good width average depth | Above average, wider than deeper. | Above average |
| Imaging | Some odd positioning choices at times. Stable once set | Quite precise and consistent | Above average, consistent |
| Details | Very nice detail retrieval on the highs. Good details on the sub-bass too | Average. | Above average |
| Separation | Instruments are well separated and the entire presentation is highly resolving. | Just about average. | Average |
| Driveability | A phone is OK | Light amping recommended | A phone is OK |
| Fit & Comfort | Very easy fit (either cable-down or over-the-ear), and great comfort | Extremely easy fit, subjective comfort | Fit might be an issue for some. Comfort is OK when fit is easy. |
| Other notes | Clean and agile, effortless sound with good detail retrieval, missing musical personality and spice. Gets better with some EQ help. | Nice “spiced-neutral” musical tuning, could use some further spice to really shine | Reference neutrality with a hint of brightness, great dynamics and above average technicalities |
| Economics | $ 99,00 ($ 30,00 deals) | $ 42,50 | $ 109,00 ($ 79,00 deals) |