FWIW, I have three three perfect, yet different configurations that I like a lot!
Schiit Jotunheim, tons of power, can’t wait to buy bal cables and try balanced, but great match
Ifi micro black label idsd, I love this straight up, on the mid gain setting ( no turbo boost needed), with or without the bass boost, I absolutely love the bass boost on this micro, it’s the best I’ve ever heard just as a bass boost. When I use the Jotunheim, I have the Loki that I can use or even combinations of these things (I can use the onboard DAC from my Jot, but I prefer the ifi micro DAC into loki, into Jot). But the micro straight up is a truly awesome match, and plenty of power!
Then I also use my little Oppo ha-2se... sometimes alone, but more often I go out of Oppo, into, *oh the shame* my little bear b4! Ok, it’s NOT The smooth, yet beautifully detailed and warm and amply powered micro, but honestly, that little b4 is a sweet soft, and in my opinion nicely matched little tiny cheap tube solution. For what it’s worth that little b4 sounds great on the back of the ifi micro if I want to use it that way also. Anyway, it has plenty of power also in my opinion and also responds to the bass boost of both units, the Oppo and the micro.
For a single solution, especially for desktop or portable, for me that micro just crushes and is a beautiful perfect match with the AFC headphones. Yes, still loving the heck out of these Dan and company! I’ve been watching all the threads and I guess I just want to add here that, I use these at bedtime so as not to disturb my wife when I’m winding down with some great music and they isolate well enough to not bother her at all, yet to me they sound so amazingly open and clean and clear and resolving in spite of being closed!… These are in my top group of three or four that I love the best that I’ve got the good fortune to have.
Two last comments FWIW. One is that while it’s amazing that they sound so nicely matched with a little, little bear b4 amp… They absolutely do not pair at all with the class A darkvoice amp. The high impedance requirement of that amp makes for and an impossible match so I don’t even bother. Evidently I could do some modification to the darkvoice to get it to play nice with low impedance cans but why bother (I love my DV with the hd600s and the 1990’s!), I have other solutions… the second thing really is that, while I have a few other favorites, in no particular order, more or less just a “horses for courses” thing, my favorites are AFC , mahogany TH x00, my beyerdynamic DT 1990s, and taking up the rear of my favorite group is my venerable HD 600s… Out of this group, I seem to gravitate to the AFC most for its honest and detailed yet smooooth presentation! It does not have the slam of the mahogany Fostex cans or the dt1990 cans but I don’t always want slam (to be clear, I feel AFC’s have incredible sub bass ability, just not the slam of those others, and I do personally think that to open up the bottom of these, a little boost is almost a necessity) !
AFC’s alway brings the great vibes!
Barrett
