Is the JOB Armors the best armors to wear?

I bought, cheap mind you, some armors that have better stats than a couple of the JOB armors my bard has now. Is it better to wear the entire set of job armors or can you mix them up if you find better?

And why does the bard male classes have DRESSES for armors? WTH is up with this effeminate crap? I realize bards are kind of wimpy but for real .....

AF is only good until you can get the gear from AK or Darklight (which Darklight to an extent now is "job specific" with the exception of casting healing and tanking)

Nope. The best gears which can be obtained without effort are the crafted i70s one. These gears are comparable to i90s because of their materia slots. Though overall i90s are better, the crafted i70s one is near at par eith i90s