To expand further on the subject: The AFC is a fantastic headphone for a lot of reasons. IMHO one reason is because it was tuned by somebody who is an expert on Orthodynamic engineering and construction, Someone who knows how to achieve euphonic sound while maintaining as much acoustical accuracy as possible.
Well designed upstream equipment is probably also tuned, though to a lesser degree because maintaining signal accuracy beyond the range of human hearing is more easily achievable compared to headphones for any given level of expenditure or “beyond” one chooses to name.
Many regard maintaining signal accuracy as the ultimate acoustic aspiration. With an appropriate selection of such “wire with gain” type equipment, the AFC will deliver its sound as uncolored by upstream equipment as it’s possible to be, and it will sound fantastic because it’s a well designed and tuned headphone.
For equipment that is designed to be other than a perfect reproduction of the original source (like tube amps), AFCs may sound better or worse depending on how the equipment interacts with the AFC’s tuning and the listener’s preferences. In my personal experience, there are those combinations out there where the weaknesses cancel each other out or the strengths reinforce. The AFCs appear to do very well with hybrid amps because they can handle low impedance high current loads and the AFCs do a great job of capturing the euphonic characteristics of tubes.
All the above is simply my opinion and at least partly thanks to a very nice Cuban rum and Boombox - Downriver Electric on my AFCs.
, but enjoy!
