A $249, 999-unit limited edition from Crinacle's CrinEar, tuned to a tilted diffuse-field 'new meta' target with a sub-bass shelf; a teardown found one dynamic driver and two balanced armatures. Across measurement rigs it tracks the Harman IE bass, sits below Harman through the presence region (the 1–6 kHz 'meta' shape) and peaks near 7–7.5 kHz. Reviewers broadly agree on a natural, well-tuned midrange, precise imaging, a balanced stage, a small comfortable shell and a well-liked modular cable. They split on the bass (clean, physical and better than other 'new meta' sets, or bloomy and soft), on the treble (tasteful sparkle, or a peaky, sibilant edge that moves with tips and insertion depth), on whether the balance is neutral-with-bass or V-shaped, on dynamics, and on value next to the cheaper Kiwi Ears KE4. It is no longer sold new.
About this product
$249, 999-unit serialized limited edition — the debut IEM of Crinacle's brand CrinEar, sold only through Crinacle's Hangout store in two March 2025 batches and sold out since. The maker never disclosed the driver count; a reviewer's teardown showed one dynamic driver and two balanced armatures. Not the cheaper, later Daybreak or the flatter Reference.
For years Crinacle was the reviewer measuring everyone else's earphones — the encyclopaedic IEM list, the B&K 5128 graph database, the collab tunings with Moondrop and Truthear. Project Meta, the first IEM from the brand CrinEar, put the measurer's own tuning under the microscope. It sold sound-unheard: 999 serialized units at $249 in two batches that each sold out in under an hour, with the driver count kept secret.
The tuning is the pitch — a tilted diffuse-field 'new meta' curve (the IEF Preference 2025 target) with a deliberate sub-bass boost, in a small aluminium shell with a modular copper cable. Reviewers mostly agree the midrange is superb and the shell comfortable; they argue about nearly everything either side of it — the bass, the treble, whether the whole reads as neutral or V-shaped, and whether it was worth $249 when cheaper sets tuned the same way exist.
