AFUL Snowy Night sounds like melted chocolate, sweet although with a little bit of bitterness

Pros & Cons of AFUL Snowy Night is at the end of the Article

AFUL as an Audio Company

AFUL is a relatively new Audio Brand that placed itself as the new block in the kid by releasing exceptional releases like Performer 5/8 and the mysterious MagicOne which is truly a work of Magic. Basically, they pioneered the engineering aspect of acoustics very promisingly. Certainly, I always look forward to this company and what it offers next.

As they dipped their toe for the first time in the DAC-AMP market with AFUL Snowy Night, they must go right otherwise there is a lot of competition in this section that would demolish the product’s existence. And I am happy to say that they did a good job.

Sound Characteristics

General Tonality

The tonality of AFUL Snowy Night overall is not neutral to me. I always feel neutral is the tonality that resembles how I hear the world around me. For me, it sounds slightly warm and at the same time dark too. Not that I dislike this tonality in any way or form. I adore matching this with a few of my IEMs and headphones.

Low-End

AFUL Snowy Night is not shy of showing off its low end. It is warm and thick. The note weights are full of heft and have distinct time before falling off. It sounds like it have no rush to do something, everything comes off very naturally and in an organic way. It doesn’t make the bass artificially elevated, just everything gets a hint of warmth. Likewise, the vocals sound richer and more forward.

• Runaway – Half Alive
• Opr – Geafallestine

Mids

Mids are rich. Not just rich, it’s full of heft and low-end elevation gave it a tremendous advantage to show it off. It is loaded with textures that come out very organically. There is not even a hint of nasal ness that you can get from low-distortion amplifiers. Mids are the best thing about AFUL Snowy Night. Mids don’t mean only vocals but they dictate the whole spectrum. Soundstage to Timber everything depends on the mids of the spectrum. And Aful did a fantastic job of reproducing that. The timbre of every instrument came out very natural and organic.

• Personal – Emotional Oranges
• Nobody Knows – Autograff

Treble

The treble of AFUL Snowy Night is recessed in a very tasteful way. The lower treble is very inoffensive basically, such that in a few IEMs I don’t feel the need to EQ, which is a very good way to showcase source since it is very easy to mess up this range due to factors that are very sensitive to handle. Therefore, it is also an indicator that AFUL used high-quality internals to make this product. The treble is not airy to my ears and won’t satisfy trebleheads. Nor it will pierce your ears if you play something very sharp.

• Caravan – Whiplash
• Mountains – Interstellar

Technicalities

Soundstaging

The soundstage of AFUL Snowy Night is not very open. It will give you more of an intimate feeling than a spacious one. It is very good for a few genres like POP and HipHop but it is not optimal for something like Orchestra or Jazz since they feel more in your face. But it is not too intimate where you feel claustrophobic, you just won’t be experiencing Albums like Interstellar – in it’s full potential. Although for small-sound staging headphones and IEMs, it doesn’t feel too claustrophobic.

• Bubbles – Yoshi Horikawa
• Opera House – Ciggerate After Sex

Localization/Imaging

Although the soundstage is not that bit, the way it uses the soundstage is pretty good. There is not a lot of space to play with its imaging but it can position instruments in the mix effortlessly. The channel separation seemed pretty good too, fast and snappy.

• Thriller – Michael Jackson
• Hideaway – Jacob Collier

Resolution

Details and resolution are not good on this device for my ears. Not that it will feel underdetailed but definitely can’t resolve enough at its price point. Not only it does not hold the trailing edges of the notes but resolution-wise it sounds busy here and there. I would not prefer it for genres like Orchestra/Western Classical. Often people dictate crispiness as resolution or detail, I am referring to detail/resolution as “How many instruments I can focus on in a mix / how transparent the overall music is”.

• Contact – Draft Punk
• Western Classicals

We studied a lot of different portable and desktop audio setups, and we realised we needed to work on the source signal transmission to enhance the acoustic performance of SnowyNight. We noticed USB transmission is not the cleanest, and digital inputs such as Coaxial, Optical provided cleaner and better transmission in most cases. But in the case of portable USB DAC/AMPs, we get limited to only USB transmissions. So, to enhance the acoustic performance in such a scenario, we bundled the SnowyNight with an enhanced cable that brings noticeable improvements by stable signal transmission, USB Lossless transmission, and also protects the sound signal from external interferences. The cable has high-purity 6N monocrystalline copper wire cores. It effectively improves the overall performance of the SnowyNight and makes it comparable to Coaxial and Optical input options in other devices.

AFUL

The Wire

Sadly I was sent the product with a Lightning Port to USB C Connection so, I haven’t tested the wire included with this DAC. Although it looks and feels very premium.

So this review is done completely with Moondrop Dawn Pro cable.

Now before jumping further let’s see the specifications of this dongle.

Specifications

DAC Chips: 2xCS43198.

Although off-the-shelf DAC chips are very good these days, their implementation matters a lot. This could differentiate a lot regarding price. What I liked most about this chip is the Clocking System, they use 22.5792 or 24.576 MHz clocks. Which means the PLL Ratio is lower. Now let me talk about the advantages of higher frequency clocks.

The advantages of lower multiplication are

• Lower Jitter
• Lower Phase Noise
• Simplified Implementation
• Power Efficiency

But it can also cause problems such as

• Not Generating a Wide Range of Frequency
• Depends on External Clocks

Birtate: 32-Bit/786kHz PCM, DSD256, DoP256.

Let’s not discuss them, because most of the Audio Files we have don’t have the quality to bottleneck them.

Output Ports: 3.5mm+4.4mm.

This is an excellent decision not to go with 2.5mm since they are thin and break easily.

Output Frequency Range: 20Hz-20kHz.

SNR: 125dB(3.5mm), 130dB(4.4mm)

Noise Floor: 1uV(3.5mm), 1.5uV(4.4mm).

DNR: 125dB(3.5mm), 130dB(4.4mm).

Operating Voltage Range: 4.2V~5.3V.

Output Level: 1Vrms(3.5mm, Low-Gain), 2Vrms(3.5mm, High-Gain), 2Vrms(4.4mm, Low-Gain), 4Vrms(4.4mm, High-Gain).

This is excellent too at this price. The 4Vrms helps greatly to drive high impedance dynamic drivers (Since they require more Voltage Swing than Current).

THD+N: ≤0.00037%.

Now this is where AFUL impressed me the most. Don’t get me wrong, our transducers have much higher distortion than this, so we won’t be able to get anywhere near the THD.

The reason why it impressed me is, occasionally companies use cheap techniques to boost the THD just to look good on paper(Overcorrection Using Feedback Loop). On the other hand by doing that they destroy the tonality of the source. This Dongle sounds nowhere near that. It doesn’t sound sterile, it doesn’t have digital essence, and it doesn’t lose note weight.

Output Power: 140mW-300mW.

It is very average nowadays to have this kind of power at the price range. It handled every IEM in my arsenal very efficiently. From Thie Audio Monarch MKII to Tripowin Olina, From IE600 to Softears RSV. Nothing felt underpowered.

Now comes the most important part of any DAC review, pairing

Neutral Tuning

This DAC is extremely tasteful for Neutrally Tuned transducers. It gave those transducers a subtle flavour, that increased the musicality.

Moondrop Blessing 2 became more fun, the treble took a backseat but the bass and vocals sounded very good.

Sotears RSV became very neutral. Surprisingly it didn’t get darker that much and the timber came out very good.

V-Shape Tuning

This DAC is best with V-shaped transducers. It elevated the low end very organically alongside it controlled the treble. This source fits V Shape Tuning Very Much

IE 600 – This not only gave the mid-bass a meaty quantity. The mids became more organic, that’s why the timber became more correct. The spiciness was reduced although it decreased the soundstage.

EA500LM – This greatly helped reduce the unrefined treble of the IEM. Alongside it also increased the midrange recession.

Compatibility with other tuning

• “Dark Tuned” – I won’t recommend this DAC for dark transducers, since it will make it darker. And the treble became veiled.
• “Brightly Tuned” – This dongle will help a lot to reduce the sharpness.
• “Mid-Focused” – This will be a great match for the transducers since it will give it a very natural and realistic timber.

Driving HD600

From 2023, the Sennheiser HD600 became my reference headphone to test every audio source. Not only it is very neutral, but it is also extremely transparent towards every single device in the audio chain. So it is very easy to judge DACs and AMPs with this headphone.

And I am happy to say that this Dongle alone, can drive HD600. Driving a headphone doesn’t mean loudness, it means how well they can retain the frequency range from 20hz – 20Khz while maintaining crest factor.

Being said that HD600 is a very hard-to-drive headphone. (I will explain about powering dynamic drivers and operation of amplifiers in future ). On a short note, it needs a very good Voltage Swing to operate fully. And AFUL SnowyNight did a very good job of bringing out the bass, the vocals didn’t feel thin. The treble became softer (Sometimes HD600’s treble might get hot). I had no problem driving them on the go.

Battery Draining

A new 4500mah battery phone with a modern 4-5nm Chipset can last easily 7 (with normal usage) hours for 3.5mm with IEMs like IE600, and EA500LM.

Pros

• Output Voltage
• Energy Consumption
• Volume Button (Steps & Construction)
• Midrange Tonality and note weight
• Well-controlled treble

Cons

• LED Light (Too bright)
• No Phone Application
• Bass Elevation is too much
• The soundstage is on the narrower side
• Micro Details and Resolution

The final and most important question

Should you buy this?

Do you want an organic and natural sound that primarily is musical and pleases your auditory senses?

Yes, you can buy this dongle.

Do you want a very high resolution and sterile sound that will sound digital and that comes with a big soundstage?

No, there are other options at this price-point.

AFUL SnowyNight is a great substitute to Moondrop Dawn Pro, combine they can tackle every kind of IEMs.

Duggu

Conclusion

I do think that at the pricepoint it stands it’s ground. Nothing groundbreaking as we expect from AFUL every time. Although as their first step towards source products. They did an outstanding job.