I haven't had a chance to crack it open yet, so letting it stew in a bit of moisture it picked up.
it was very quiet from the get-go which is sus. it has the ground springs, not the newer DT SWISS-like "basic" springs. will relube carefully w/ptfe and report back on the findings.
opened it up and wiped everything down - it had some dirt inside the ratchet engagement splines on the freehub side after one wet ride, but the bearings were fine. the ratchet ground spring does not look symmetrical, so I flipped it and lubed everything with dumond classic. sounds ok now but I haven't tested engagement under similar conditions yet.
also, strangely enough the orange ano alu freehub body is either too long or my sensa 11-sp cassette carrier was out of spec because there was play before i added a 2mm spacer. everything's so hit and miss with AE in my experience.