I got my AK120ii yesterday. It's an impressive device; sturdy, well-engineered, attractive. The interface is fairly intuitive and very responsive. And the sound?
For context I should say I am no audiophile. The fanciest component I own is a Fiio E10 USB DAC, and for years all of my portable listening has been with an iPod or iPhone with decent canal phones like Etymotic HF3 or Klipsch S4s. Before getting the AK I got a set of Sennheiser I8's and that is what I hooked up for the initial listen since I know the sound they give me from an IOS device.
My initial impression, listening to some FLAC and ALAC files, was "Hmmm...this is pretty nice." Not blow my socks off great, but clearly a step up from an iPod. Then, this morning, I put on an album I just acquired from HDTracks--Shelby Lynne's "Little Bit of Lovin'" in AIFF format.
Click. The light went on. I don't have all the inside vocabulary yet...I'll just say that the level of detail combined with spaciousness in the sound really wowed me. I'd never heard the recording before, and maybe I would enjoy it just as much in a 360k iTunes version on my phone...but somehow I doubt it.
Over the weekend I'll have the chance to do some A/B comparisons with my iPod Classic, which is loaded with ALAC files, and that should give me a better idea of the differences. It's not clear to me (yet) that I what I can hear is worth the high premium price, but this morning I certainly was impressed.
Next, I'll hook up the Shure SE846's that I got at the same time and see what THAT does.