The curious case of a (probably) fake Fadel

A few weeks ago a friend called me to tell me that he has a relative leaving Lebanon for good and she's selling everything including her husband's old oud. I met the lady (and the oud), and all she knew about it is that it was made by someone famous in Iraq and that her husband (who was a professional musician) changed the rosette with one with his own name on. I looked inside and there was a Mohamad Fadel Label , 8-3-1967, nbr: 3617.
Ok we all know the drill, Fadel labels mean nothing and the oud is totally assymetrical in bowl shape and bridge position, I was about to say that I am not interested and politely leave , but the build is clean and aside from a high action and a small crack on the face and lot of dust, the oud seemed in good shape for a 50 years old oud.
It had three strings remaining, so I (kinda) tuned them and played and the sound was very nice.
The asking price was slightly above the price of a fake and way below a genuine Fadel, so I decided to play the oud Russian Roulette and got it.

Long story to say that there is something about the sound of this oud that I like a lot. Fake or not, I don't know but after fixing the action and putting new strings, I can say that I like it, what do you think?

Raw recording (zoomH6) click to download