Mr. Speakers AEON

Didn't like the Ether C all that much. Got it upgraded to the Ether Flow and liked that a little better, but not enough to keep it. Twice bitten, and very gun shy after that, but a number of credible folks saying that the bright + thin character of the Ethers has been addressed with the Aeons convinced me to give the Aeon closed a try. Glad I did.

Balanced, neutral (but not neutered). Remarkably good SQ for a closed can. Excellent build and comfort. This is what the Ether C / Ether C Flow should have been.

The other aspect that gets my juices flowing and panties moist is that this headphone costs significantly less than the Ethers. Paying attention Audeze? HiFiMan? It can be done. You don't need to rape and gouge with every new product release.

I am liking this headphone so much that I am thinking about the Aeon Open, but I really can't justify it as I already have a HEKv2 and HD800S.

 

AFO continues to impress me. The transition from Magni 3 to SEX 3.0 was a considerable one with this headphone. More body and richness especially in the mid range vocals. And the sound stage moved a little off the shoulders giving a better sense of air for more credibility.

I'm a self professed 650 fan boy. It's been my go to for years. The experiment that I like to conduct is to listen to the 650 for an hour or so until I get to a place where it wows me. And then take it off and switch to another headphone. This works much better than A/B for me. The mind plays too many tricks when going back and forth very quickly.

Each time that I did this with 650>AFO, the AFO impressed me more. Here is why:

*AFO has more resolution and detail. More transparent to the recording without causing me fatigue (I'm treble shy)

*sub bass is clearly more present. It extends deeper and is much better on decay...super quick.

*my engagement/enjoyment factor goes up. Even when waiting for the "wow" moment with the 650 in changing to the AFO, my level of enjoyment went up a level each and every time.

 

An SBAF senior members shootout of AFO Vs 660S would be welcome. One of these may be my next keeper.

 

The headphone that makes @Hands put his 650 for sale will be my next headphone. I have not seen such love before.

He was one of the reasons I got on the 650 train in the first place. Would've definitely overlooked a 2003 headphone and bought an Audeze EL8 without SBAF.

 

Damn, I am seriously considering to sell all my headphones except afo and modded 6xx.
(Sbaf members should have at one pair of 600/650/6xx for the purpose of subjective comparisons. IMO it's de facto standard! )

Really enjoyed and loved efo & eikon, but afo (particularly with taboo4) scores much higher points to my preference/criteria...

 

Is having a man bun enough to get good seal?

 

Apologies if this has been covered, but how is the AFO's isolation?

I wouldn't be expecting it to compare to a true closed can, but at times my wife may be watching TV in the next room, or more frequent, our home's A/C return is in the same room that I have my rig, providing an audible background noise.

 

OTOH, AFC has excellent isolation. It's about as good as you're going to get with closed over-ears without ANC, especially for this caliber of headphones (I'd be curious if someone knows of anything comparable in this department). Any time there is even light background noise, I reach for AFC rather than open or semi-open headphones.

 

Just what others said with one additional comment. The AFO has felt covering the outside/back of the cups, so that sound leaking out the headphones is not nearly as much as other open headphones I own, like the hd800. So I can wear them at my desk without others complaining much about the music being too loud.

 

Good to know. This may be a solid choice for an at-work rig. I was considering picking up another 650 to leave at work, but the AFO is still on the radar.

 

My experience with the AFO has been in line with others here.

I posted my trip to The Source AV on head fi last week and I'll jus give the TLDR here.

Never had the privilege to listen to mid to upper tier cans until I went to the source AV. Spent maybe a day and a half there listening to EVERYTHING (luckily, their demo AFO was delivered while I was there). At the end of 7+ hours of audition time, my conclusion was I could not leave unless I preordered the AFO. (I really enjoyed the their pair of EFO and did not find the issues that many on SBAF had on them. I liked them slightly better than the AFO, but not $1,000 better).

For the past day, I been swapping back and forth from HD650 + Bottlehead Crack and AFO + Magni 2U (Mjolnir 2 order is taking too long to get here!). Source for both is Gungnir Multibit. I still love the HD650 + BHC pairing. The AFO + Magni2U is not bad, just not as good as the pairings I was auditioning with at the source AV (Chord hugo 2, CMA600i, Enigma Athena A1). Can't wait to pair the AFO with the Mjo2.

@Hands is correct about the seal. I wear glasses and I find that I do need to take off my glasses and have them sit on top of the pads for the 'optimum' listening experience.

 

AFO feels like you're wearing a closed headphone. In essence, it feels like you're wearing an AFC, only your ears don't get as sweaty, and high frequency is attenuated way less.

I am on the fence with the 1-notch felt for the AFO. the 1 notch felt damping does alleviate some of 8-10khz (small) peak the AFO has, but it also lowers the upper midrange-lower treble too much for my liking. I think the AFO is more balanced and neutral sounding without the 1-notch felts, but its treble isn't as smooth. I would use the foams for a happy medium, but those things are too thick so are a no-go.

 

Sounds like the job for somebody with measuring equipment.

 

fwiw I find the AFO to be reasonably isolating - I can have the TV on (not terribly loud) and not really have it be intrusive.

I can't have reading glasses on - they have to balance on top.

Looking forward to testing it with a couple of different DAC/amp combos in the next few days. I have the black (thinnest) inserts in and that is working, but some albums (I Robot comes to mind) can be a bit strident. Most Pink Floyd albums otoh are quite smooth. And interesting to get to hear some details on electric bass (since I play that) on some albums that I never really noticed before. Dee Murray's tone on Goodbye Yellow Brick Road is quite crunchy and tasteful.