[AndrewOld]

Yes you are correct in that, but it's the supplied power over the USB coming from the source that would be the issue especially from phone's. It's their battery playing time that would suffer
Galvanic isolation is only really necessary with very old, electrically noisy PC's and laptops. This was because they had relatively primitive switching power supplies. These were Operating at relatively low frequencies This area of technology has been going through a revolution over the last six or seven years with vast improvements occurring. There were many more old source products around a few years ago. Modern laptop, pads and PCs just don't have the levels of ground modulation that would cause problems these days and phone's have virtually none at all so because Robs DAC technology is immuned also to Incoming jitter we felt it was not necessary to include galvanic isolation into Hugo2

If that is the case, why does Rob himself use his DAVE with either an Audioquest Jitterbug or from batteries? Does he not have a modern laptop?

 

[DaveRedRef-III]

I think Chord has a very bold and distinct design identity. As said before beauty is in the eyes of the beholder but two things you cannot argue with is that it gives a "built to last" impression and secondly that impression turns out to be well justified.

I'd also add that their product design is distinctively Chord. It shows imagination and that goes hand in hand with the work Rob does. Chord doesn't follow the field.

 

[gearspro]

Lots of us see Hugo 2 as mini DAVE and are counting the days until it's released!!

Thans for the advice.

 

[gearspro]

It depends on what your budget is and what functionality you're looking for.  If you are looking for a desktop setup and want the absolute best resolution DAC/amp that can drive most headphones extremely well, it's hard to do better than DAVE. 

If you don't mind a bit of compromise in performance but in return, you get portability while also saving enough money to buy a few more headphones, like ECWL has said, it would be very hard to beat Hugo2.  Personally, I would choose Hugo2 over TT today.

I believe that I should buy a cheaper dac and better headphones. The thing is tha dave looks so awesome and so good reviews.

 

[gearspro]

It depends on what your budget is and what functionality you're looking for.  If you are looking for a desktop setup and want the absolute best resolution DAC/amp that can drive most headphones extremely well, it's hard to do better than DAVE. 

If you don't mind a bit of compromise in performance but in return, you get portability while also saving enough money to buy a few more headphones, like ECWL has said, it would be very hard to beat Hugo2.  Personally, I would choose Hugo2 over TT today.

Or I should buy dave and save money for better headphones. ,,Z. I prefer desktop installation. I believe dave is better than hugo2, that's why and the price is different.

 

[JaZZ]

 

It depends on what your budget is and what functionality you're looking for.  If you are looking for a desktop setup and want the absolute best resolution DAC/amp that can drive most headphones extremely well, it's hard to do better than DAVE. 

If you don't mind a bit of compromise in performance but in return, you get portability while also saving enough money to buy a few more headphones, like ECWL has said, it would be very hard to beat Hugo2.  Personally, I would choose Hugo2 over TT today.

 
Or I should buy dave and save money for better headphones. ,,Z. I prefer desktop installation. I believe dave is better than hugo2, that's why and the price is different.

 
I would also have recommended to go with the Hugo² and a TOTL headphone, but if you insist in the DAVE: The HD 800 (modified and/or equalized) would make an excellent combo and wouldn't add much to the expense.

 

[jelt2359]

 
I would also have recommended to go with the Hugo² and a TOTL headphone, but if you insist in the DAVE: The HD 800 (modified and/or equalized) would make an excellent combo and wouldn't add much to the expense.

Personally, Hugo2 + Utopia or Dave + HD800/S (just to give an example), I'd go for the latter. This is not an indictment of any of the items in the chain (heck, I have not even heard the Hugo2), but the HD800/S and the Dave is an incredible combi that is really really end-game. The HD800/S remains one of my favourite headphones, especially modded.

 

[ubs28]

I would personally go for the Focal Utopia first and then later upgrade to the Chord Dave if you got the money. Then you can use the Hugo 2 as your portable DAC while the Chord Dave will be your home based DAC.

 

[EVOLVIST]

The only thing that Davina will do (in digital mode) that Blu can't is sample rate convert from 768k to 44.1k (say).

Yes my Dad is David - my second name is David - John Franks brother is David...

I know this is incredibly juvenile of me, but I just couldn't help myself, since I've been listening to a lot of this with my DAVE...

[VIDEO]https://youtu.be/NFo7khMeUAw[/VIDEO]

So, are we saying that fed a 24/192 file in digital mode, that Davina can downsample the file to 16/44.1 without decrementing the sound?

 

[Rob Watts]

No - but hopefully the reduction in SQ will be small - that's the intent. Its very much easier to decimate to 48k from 192k, and this should be relatively transparent; but going to 44.1 from 192 means M scaling it to 104.25 MHz then decimating back to 44.1 kHz. Non integer SRC is very tough to do transparently, and conventionally they make a poor job of it with large amounts of distortion and noise and timing errors. 

 

[gearspro]

It depends on what your budget is and what functionality you're looking for.  If you are looking for a desktop setup and want the absolute best resolution DAC/amp that can drive most headphones extremely well, it's hard to do better than DAVE. 

If you don't mind a bit of compromise in performance but in return, you get portability while also saving enough money to buy a few more headphones, like ECWL has said, it would be very hard to beat Hugo2.  Personally, I would choose Hugo2 over TT today.

Thank you for your advice. I make my research and with the same amount of money I can buy hugo2 , I found it with 2.1K here https://www.hiendplay.com/product/chord-hugo-2/, and any pair of headphones I want. And save money. I am not sure adout the headphones yet. Maybe Audeze, maybe grado, I don't know. Any advice? I listen rock music and sometimes jazz.

 

[analogmusic]

one of the recent Daft Punk album was recorded on analog tape and digital, and it was mastered on 88.2 (as probably decimation back to 44.1 sounds better)

 

[Deftone]

I've been reading the Dave posts prior to and after deciding to purchase a Dave.  They have been very informative and helped with the decision. I particularly appreciate the input from the Chord team giving an insight into the technicalities of Dave and the future improvements with new Chord products.  I took a look at their website to better understand  the benefits of the M scaler, part of the upcoming Blue2.  Among the photos displayed, one shows a stack with Blue2 above Dave in the fancy cradles.  Although sonically, Dave has been very satisfying, I have been critical of the aesthetics.  I have over time, come to overlook its eccentricities.  However,
the photo of Blue2 combined with Dave shows to me an almost complete lack of consistency of design among the various products.  Beyond the sharing of the basic case design; controls, display and decoration are all over the place and look a mess.  Possibly Chord originally intended Dave to be a stand alone product for headfi use.  Now that there is a clear intention that Dave will have dedicated amps and ways to integrate the M scaler tech, I really hope Chord take some time to design boxes that complement each other in a consistent, coherent and practical way so that owners will be proud to have them on display.

Each to their own dude, I think the blu2 Dave combo in black on the choral stand looks stunning !

 

[rkt31]

  Yes HD recordings benefit too; I am listening to Hildegard Von Bingen: Vox Cosmica (96 24b) at the moment - and I have never heard it sound so good. But what it does do is act as a giant leveler; the format is not important as the original recording is way more important; and I get a bigger improvement from RBCD with 1960's recordings, where the simple mic techniques, custom and simple optimized mixing really shines through.
 
Me too on 1M, I don't relish the design challenges of cascading multiple FPGA's together in an array. The power is less of a problem - each FPGA would have it's own regulator, so we are not talking about multiplying 10A@1V but 2A@5V. Even so a 16M scaler would be 32A at 5V!
 
Rob 

you are right. the original recording quality is way too more important. i also listened to vox cosmica album in 24 96 ( i liked track 2 very much ) through mojo. i never listened such a transparent recording before. ( i have so many audiophile high res recordings of a number of audiophile labels ) the sound of bells is just like listening the real bells in front of you. one could imagine how this recording would sound with dave and M scaler .

 

[EVOLVIST]

  you are right. the original recording quality is way too more important. i also listened to vox cosmica album in 24 96 ( i liked track 2 very much ) through mojo. i never listened such a transparent recording before. ( i have so many audiophile high res recordings of a number of audiophile labels ) the sound of bells is just like listening the real bells in front of you. one could imagine how this recording would sound with dave and M scaler .

Are we talking about this recording?
 
http://www.carpediem-records.de/en/vox-cosmica