@ Cante Ista : I appreciate your apprehension and although I do not work for Cavalli , I think it is clear that he is a dear friend and that I am involved with CA more than the average headfier. He runs a one man show and as such can get overloaded and it is more so at these times that I lend a hand, much like I would do for any other friend. I strive to retain a sense of neutrality , but I really like the gear Alex designs. I have built practically every amp he designed in the DIY forums, and tested many that never made it to the forums for various reasons - usually because he figured out a "better" way to do something and thus released the improved versions for DIY. This obviously changed when he started his commercial company but we have remained friends and I occasionally test concepts. This is my own doing as I enjoy this part of the hobby more than most things - tinkering. I do not own a headphone that has not been modified in some way, nearly all headphones are tested against a certain spec and this is offered to the public at large. When you know how to tailor something to suite yourself, it is difficult to leave it alone. That said, the only dynamic headphone I have kept is the K501, I really like it and it does so many things well. It does not have the agility of the planarmagnetics ( of which I own my fair share ) and thus I am intrinsically drawn to planar designs. I do not dislike stats either, I think they do many things well but in large, I have not felt that I was missing anything by not buying into the stat hype. I probably don't take myself seriously enough. I should probably allow Alex to address the affiliations he has with Stax, Audeze, Sennheiser, HiFiMan and JPS amongst others. These are the products he has at shows and are often photographed with his electronics. The Abyss does benefit from serious amplification, (for the "orthoheads" it is less sensitive than the infamous wharfedale isodynamic ) , the Liquid Gold is serious amplification. He could have used the HE6 but there is a new toy on the block. To my knowledge, ( no lets say it outrightly ) there is no financial agreement between CA or any other vendor.
..dB