If 1795 is the price, wouldn’t it just make sense to buy a hugo 2 instead for the few extra hundred it costs? Being that it can do the exact sake thing anyway plus a whole lot more and has a built in amp anyway.
$2,379 minus $1,795 equals $584. Those are significant savings. And it would be ~$784 cheaper if/when the US price is matched to the UK's.
General consensus is that the 2Qute sounds better than the Hugo. It makes sense that the Qutest could sound better than the Hugo 2 as well.
There are a few potential reasons for this, but the main one in my eyes is the external power supply vs an internal battery.
The Qutest also has galvanic isolation, dual BNC coax inputs, a more robust chassis, that Qute-style light on top, etc.
So it's not the exact same thing; it just has the same digital guts, so to speak.
Many who use speaker systems would want the Qutest rather than the Hugo 2.
Many who use headphones would want (or need, particularly in the case of electrostats) an external amp rather than driving them directly from the Hugo 2.
With the right cables, the Qutest (like the 2Qute) can still drive conventional headphones and some sensitive passive speakers directly; just with less power and no built-in volume control.
This thing is half the price of a Hugo2
$2,379 divided by 2 is $1,189.50, so...no. It's roughly 3/4 the price.