For this reason I wouldn’t recommend the duo to anyone but a crazy audiophile willing to live on the bleeding edge.
Agreed, one thing tipping the scale in Chord's favor is discounts available will make it cheaper than the Bartok while also sounding better. However, if you do eventually go down the crazy custom PSU route a lot of people are going... at this point i'm throwing my hands in the air and saying i've had enough I don't care if it does sound better than the Vivaldi stack as people claim, I'd rather live with a worse sounding Bartok.The all-in-one convenience factor is making me lean Bartok. Once I get an mScaler with the Dave, the price isn't much different anymore.
It's best to be realistic though : if you do go down the Bartok route you'll also probably add the Rossini clock later as it's the only upgrade path available. Not as easy to tinker with that.