Foreword

1. The following reviews of IEMs will always be based on its own prowess relative to its price. When I say something about an IEM is good or bad, it will always be relative to how much is the retail of it.
2. I will be using DACs relative to the price of the IEM to review them. For this pair, the JA21 shall be used.
3. This pair of IEM was sent to me by Keephifi, thank you for that. However, they are in NO WAY influencing this review, hence all the opinions are of my own.

If you are interested in purchasing this pair of IEM, you can do so with this non-affiliated link :
Keephifi : https://keephifi.com/products/kbear-storm?_pos=1&_sid=10daa67f3&_ss=r


UNBOXING & ACCESSORIES
Unboxing is fairly standard with the sleeved box. Sliding ti out reveals the beautiful headshells and inside it we are given quite a decent (and this is a genuine complement) cable with 2 sets of eartips - the ash grey being the universal type and the white one being a short nozzle wide-bored eartips. I appreciate KBEAR giving us 2 types of different eartips to help with the fitment.

And also, a cover for the jack? KBEAR is being too generous here when most of the company does even do that. I really appreciate this attention and care they put into this.


BUILD & FIT
The build of the IEM is made of a plastic shell, but has been accented in this beautiful combination of a purple faceplate and blue transparent shell combo, giving it aesthetics that definitely sets it apart from the rest. The nozzle is of metal material which is a plus. The shell overall is also light which poses no problem for prolonged hours of listening.


The fit of this IEM is fairly good with the provided tips, with me preferring short-nozzle wide bore tips. There is no instances of discomfort anywhere when wearing this pair of IEMs.



In terms of how the tips affect sound, to me its not to a very significant degree but the normal tips certainly gave slightly more in terms of bass (sub rumble and impact), but again, its not that significant till the point where it affects the general tuning of it.


SOUND
Source : Foobar 2k -> J-cally JA21 CX21988 (Conexant) -> Stock KBEAR Storm




In general, the KBEAR Storm is a V shaped IEM with a slightly warm characteristic to it and slightly more emphasis on the mids and treble region.

BASS
For the price, its good.

• Subbass on the Storm has fairly polite rumble, but feels like its being held back
• Subbass has very quick roll off
• Kick drums are punchy with adequate impact
• Bass notes are resolving, pleasing to hear with no bloatiness
• Note definition on this pair is definitely on the rumblier/grittier style, but does not show any clarity loss as every note is heard clearly
• No instances of bass bleed

MIDS
Things that live around the mids to upper mids are definitely having more life to it, sounding more airy yet retains natural timbre of things.

Vocals :
After listening to quite an amount of budget IEMs recently, this one certain caught my attention having above average performance in the vocals (generally in the timbre section, sounding natural and more transparent)

• Male vocals - overall sounding more forward and intimate with a natural but with slightly nasal characteristics in certain tracks. Certain tracks definitely make male vocals sound more bright but not colored
• Female vocals - generally sounding more strong compared to male vocals and sounds slightly further back. Instances of vocal sibilance is none from my testing. Sharp? sure, but never sibilant. In certain tracks female vocals might sound slightly dry.

Instruments :

• Guitars would sound rounded, smooth but maybe lacking details ever so little for some reason
• Strings such as violins sound light and floaty inside tracks
• Piano key has body and presents the timbre well - being light when needed but never shy to be strong
• Macrodetails and microdetails in the mids to upper-mid region stands its own ground but does not fight with the main instruments and tracks.
• Choir/vocal ensembles definitely have slightly more presence than certain IEMS - sounds natural, transparent, and has extension to it, does well in itself as supporting tracks to the song.
• Foleys and accompanying microdetails such as guitar plucks, slides against the strings, synth decays are all well controlled - not being too dry to make the track sound hard, yet not putting too much emphasis till it feels too much

HIGHS
I think for this pair, drums for some reason just sounds heavenly. Complementing this with the well executed imaging and seperation, nothing sounds busy and blurry.

• Hi hats in general will definitely sound slightly darker but not noticable unless compared to other IEMs.
• in certain tracks with trap type hats or hip-hop/rap will have slightly peaky hats, but at the same time complements the energy for the songs.
• Cymbal and ride crashes has a sort of dark roll off
• Details in the treble region is presented aggresively, sounding soft in terms of timbre and volume, yet emphasizes its presence
• Instrument details that lie at the treble region will have a very light yet luscious feel to it

TECHNICALITIES
Suprisingly, the first I've noticed from this pair in term of its technicality is its detail retrieval. Very nuanced details from tracks are bring brought out and being seperated well. Macrodetails and microdetails feels very well complemented and supporting the main parts well.
With that said, the dynamics of this pair is fairly strong as well, with the ability to present multiple tracks without having 1 overshadowing the other. Personally I always jump back to Mac Miller - Swimming for testing dynamics and all I can say is I'm hearing things that should've laid back in the track suddenly comes forward, adding more to the track. Other than that, anything from Tony Anderson's Nuit album is a trip in itself

Which brings us to imaging and seperation, in which this pair has quite good of. Every single element of songs can be heard with clear distinction without any blending together.

In terms of soundstage, it is decent for the price, albeit sounds slightly echo-ey in certain tracks. It definitely is okay for the width but lacks depth, hence elements will sound more closer to you than having a distance



*note : the sticker is not related to the IEMs in anyway it is just an aesthetic change to my SMSL amp*


FINAL THOUGHTS
As it is, I am honestly amazed by the prowess of this pair. It's definitely not everyday I can still say a random pair of IEMs that comes to me can perform with no flaws, because I seriously can't think of any for this. The first impression of the slightly elevated mids and highs definitely made me have a skew of expecting maybe elements from those regions will be harsh, but there isn't. There just isn't any.

For the price, I think it already surpasses quite a lot of IEMs in this range, just for the technicality alone. Would I recommend this to anyone wanting a pair of decent but cheap earphones? Definitely.

Again, if you are interested in purchasing this pair of IEM, you can do so with this non-affiliated link :
Keephifi : https://keephifi.com/products/kbear-storm?_pos=1&_sid=10daa67f3&_ss=r