[dallan]

C
Interestingly I have twice been at events where Chord demo the XC and Hugo combination. In their opinion in pairs well.

I liked the XC with the Hugo TT when i heard it at Canjam.

 

[audionewbi]

A discussion topic that hopefully members can direct me to the possible answer. Do you guys think certain DAC chip plays PCM files better than DSD files, despite them supporting both format natively? I ask this as I sense calyx M deals with DXD file better than DSD.

The way I test it is using 2L nordic test files available free online. I feel DXD is able to maintain the 'organic' sound of DSD while keeping the higher frequency more vibrant and less harsh, which to me DSD can sound harsh at time.

Chord hugo is different, it seem to be immune to whether playing 16/44.1, DXD, DSD it all sounds the same, at least to me and that is not a bad thing. Honestly even lossy files sound darn good.

Using XiVero GmbH I am testing their XiSRC file, worth every cent in my opinion. The ISP feature alone worth the purchase. I am really enjoying all this new findings. While I cant say I hear the different when using HUGO but with my other players, like calyx M, I can hear a different which is pleasing to my ears.
 
Do different DAC chips have a preferred format? 

 

[Currawong]

  A discussion topic that hopefully members can direct me to the possible answer. Do you guys think certain DAC chip plays PCM files better than DSD files, despite them supporting both format negatively? I ask this as I sense calyx M deals with DXD file better than DSD.

The way I test it is using 2L nordic test files available free online. I feel DXD is able to maintain the 'organic' sound of DSD while keeping the higher frequency more vibrant and less harsh, which to me DSD can sound harsh at time.

Chord hugo is different, it seem to be immune to whether playing 16/44.1, DXD, DSD it all sounds the same, at least to me and that is not a bad thing. Honestly even lossy files sound darn good.

Using XiVero GmbH I am testing their XiSRC file, worth every cent in my opinion. The ISP feature alone worth the purchase. I am really enjoying all this new findings. While I cant say I hear the different when using HUGO but with my other players, like calyx M, I can hear a different which is pleasing to my ears.
 
Do different DAC chips have a preferred format? 

Regular DAC chips have built-in filters, which are usually fairly average. You can observe this if you use Audirvana Plus' built-in iZotope engine to up-sample to 384k (equivalent to 8x oversampling of 48k but using special algorithms) on a DAC that can receive up to that via USB (I used an Aurender Flow). The difference in the quality of instrument reproduction versus no-upsampling is significant IMO. I believe that is why many people favour the high-res versions of music over the CD quality ones. The Hugo and other Chord digital products use what amounts to 2048x oversampling using Rob Watts' custom code, so whatever you feed it, be it CD quality or DXD, you'll get the same sound quality. 
 
A few DACs out there have their own FPGA with custom filters feeding a regular DAC chip with comparable results over using just the DAC chip filters, though their will obviously be significant differences to the code. 

 

[rkt31]

@barid, I run Hugo directly into benchmark ahb2 power amp. this amp has only xlr input. I got rca to xlr cable made from furutech balance bulk cable fa220. I kept length only 0.75m as both Hugo and the amp are not very big. at rca end I kept the shield part floating but at xlr end I got shield to pin 1, + to pin 2 and - to pin 3. I could have shield connected to sleeve at rca end but I felt keeping shield floating at rca gave me more separation between the two channel. the results of feeding Hugo directly to power amp are phenomenal transparency and clarity.

 

[barid]

Thank you all for the info!

 

[ambrose1985]

curious if we can use the ifi ipower on the chord hugo to further improve the SQ ?

 

[elviscaprice]

  curious if we can use the ifi ipower on the chord hugo to further improve the SQ ?

 
No, Hugo is battery operated.  All your doing with the power supply is recharging the battery.  There is no direct current powering the Hugo from the power supply.  All battery.
Now, that is not to say you can't open up the Hugo and modify it, which I plan on doing upon warranty expiration.  Still another year away.

 

[SAP7]

And why on God's earth would you want to modify it?

 

[elviscaprice]

And why on God's earth would you want to modify it?

 
For curiosity sakes and the love of tinkering.  See earlier posts on mods.

 

[rkt31]

a cheap upgrade can be to put a snap on ferrite core on the Hugo power cord just before the pin. I am waiting for the these kind of clips cheaply available on net. I have placed these clips on digital coaxial cable between Hugo and blu Ray player and there were improvements in imaging. I have put these clips on the power cord of blu Ray player also besides putting audioquest jiiterbug on both USB inputs of blu Ray player. with these little investments the sound improved further in the areas of dynamics, imaging and over all blacker background.

 

[doraymon]

a cheap upgrade can be to put a snap on ferrite core on the Hugo power cord just before the pin. I am waiting for the these kind of clips cheaply available on net. I have placed these clips on digital coaxial cable between Hugo and blu Ray player and there were improvements in imaging. I have put these clips on the power cord of blu Ray player also besides putting audioquest jiiterbug on both USB inputs of blu Ray player. with these little investments the sound improved further in the areas of dynamics, imaging and over all blacker background.

I was looking into the same possibility but using them on a USB cable.
My understanding from earlier posts is that Hugo eliminates any jitter but can still suffer from RF noise.
I guess ferrite cores can help reducing it

 

[rkt31]

noise can also create jitter. jitterbug actually cleans the USB power and thus reduces the possibility of jitter. ferrite core on USB cable should improve the sound quality even with Hugo. there is no harm in using the trick anyway.

 

[highfell]

noise can also create jitter. jitterbug actually cleans the USB power and thus reduces the possibility of jitter. ferrite core on USB cable should improve the sound quality even with Hugo. there is no harm in using the trick anyway.

Can you send a link please of the ferrite core ones you bought. I have been thinking of buying the reclocker from wyred 4sound, it this seems a much cheaper option !

 

[uzi2]

noise can also create jitter. jitterbug actually cleans the USB power and thus reduces the possibility of jitter. ferrite core on USB cable should improve the sound quality even with Hugo. there is no harm in using the trick anyway.

Jitter isn't an issue with the Hugo, but RF noise is, so anything that cleans up the USB signal is going to help. Optical does not suffer in this way.

 

[doraymon]

  USB cables can make a difference to the sound - not due to source jitter (as this is completely removed by Hugo), but due to the amount of RF noise that gets injected into the ground plane of Hugo. More RF noise, more noise floor modulation, which makes it sound brighter. Unfortunately, I suspect some expensive USB cables actually make RF noise levels worse, so it will sound brighter and give the impression of more detail. So my advice is to be careful if it sounds brighter!
 
Another issue is signal dependent ground currents that are distorted - these currents come from the source when processing the data - but the cable can't do much to change this, as it is a low frequency error. Galvanic isolation can be made to work to solve both the RF noise injection, and the distorted signal dependent ground currents. These ground currents affect sound stage depth, as the corrupting signals are at their worst when the data crosses through zero, as all the bits switch from all 0's to all 1's and vice versa - so it degrades low level details, which are the cues for depth perception.
 
Rob

 
 

noise can also create jitter. jitterbug actually cleans the USB power and thus reduces the possibility of jitter. ferrite core on USB cable should improve the sound quality even with Hugo. there is no harm in using the trick anyway.

@rkt31 I was referring to the first part of Rob Watts sentence above where he states that source jitter is completely removed by Hugo. As such I didn't even bother considering devices like the AQ Jitterbug. Am I wrong?
 
Regarding Galvanic isolation to avoid distorted signal dependent ground currents... well... this is beyond my actual knowledge level. I would need to do some reading...