[pearljam50000]

Is there any chance the price will drop to 1000$ one day?

 

[bmichels]

I'm a bit suprised that there's so little talk about the crossfeed filters in the Hugo. I was first introduced to listening with crossfeed in Fideila (mac osx). But I think the crossfeed is actually better in the Hugo. With Fidelia the crossfeed makes the bass impact weaker. Crossfeed in the Hugo doesn't affect bass impact at all.

I prefer the lowest setting of crossfeed (red light). It's subtle, but the effect is still very noticable. It makes listening over longer periods less fatiguing, and quite often it sounds better. But that depends alot on the recordings. I listen to alot of jazz and classical, and often the instruments are placed extremely far to the sides. Crossfeed "fixes" this. I just like how easy it is to just press a button to get the effect.

 
I can't hear any difference between crossfeed ON or OFF !   anyone else ?   I must really have bad Ears ?  

 

[jude]

  I can't hear any difference between crossfeed ON or OFF !   anyone else ?   I must really have bad Ears ?  

 
@bmichels, I'm not sure why you can't hear it. Perhaps you're not sensitive to the imaging shift it imparts, and/or perhaps you're listening to stereo recordings with very little difference between the left and right channels, or monaural recordings?
 
Listen to this video (particularly the first minute or so) with headphones on...
 

 
...and switch through the Hugo's crossfeed settings. You'll get it.
 
(And if you want to hear Shannon Hoon sing a capella, turn off crossfeed, and switch your channel balance all the way to the left at the beginning of the song. It's pretty cool.) 

 

[SilverEars]

   
I can't hear any difference between crossfeed ON or OFF !   anyone else ?   I must really have bad Ears ?  

I must have bad ears also.  

   I haven't checked with many tracks.

 

[wisnon]

How much? 300k? I'll stick wit the Hugo. An outstanding dac at any price.

It was a demo room at a Swiss hi-end maker.
 
So far I have had 3 of them in the Geneva area and that was the 2nd cheapest of the 3 in my quick estimation. CH was less and Goldmund was double that price. CH and Goldmund were an all digital demo. DarTZeel was both analog and digital. Prices are for the entire system assembled, not for just the Dac. Dacs used were by Goldmund, CH Precision and Playback Designs.
 
My point was not about the Hugo here, it was about how good analog can sound to an analog agnostic (me).
 
How many Uber-Dacs have you listened to? The Hugo has a great innovative digital section and is a versatile performer for not too much money. If you think it takes on all uber-Dacs, then I have some swamp land in Fla to sell you. LoL. There is a reason why Chord has a QBD76 HD. It has a highly uncompromised power supply and analog section and when as we all expect it is Hugo-ized, it will wipe the floor with the current Hugo. I have no doubts about that and deep down you must know that too.

 

[Sonic77]

It was a demo room at a Swiss hi-end maker.

So far I have had 3 of them in the Geneva area and that was the 2nd cheapest of the 3 in my quick estimation. CH was less and Goldmund was double that price. CH and Goldmund were an all digital demo. DarTZeel was both analog and digital.

My point was not about the Hugo here, it was about how good analog can sound to an analog agnostic (me).

I get your point, but Again at what cost? The Hugo gives great sound at a great cost. My point you don't have to spend 300k to get great sound and yes analog can sound good if your willing to pay and put up with snaps crackles and pops.

 

[Sound Eq]

so guys after i guess many had bought bought a cable to connect iOS to hugo which is the best cable to buy 

 

[wisnon]

Sonic, you dont quite get my point. The speakers were $75K the monblocs were $150K and the rest of the gear made up the difference. The TT was a reconstructed vintage and was in my estimate about $30K.
 
It was not the TT that made the difference though, as not every album was the same. Herve played a CD and then the same vinyl album to demonstrate the difference. I then remarked that vinyl has crackles and I prefer the silence of CDs and then he put on the Supertramps made of some special material and it retained all the analog goodness and was silent as a CD! That vinyl album was better than CD in every single way.
 
Again, just wait till the QBD updated with Hugo type digital comes out and you will see the true desktop potential of the current Chord/Watts development. I am not sure that ANY digital could beat what I heard off that Supertramp album though...and I am still in the digital camp (it is still the future and will get better). Vinyl is too much hassle. LoL

 

[ALRAINBOW]

It's not about me looking for. A uber dac it's about design criterior being put in place. I guess I am wring but I feel he feels dsd is not good so the Prut does seem to have effort in this type of playback. And the vinyl comment is just wrong on so many levels but again it's all,opinions . That's my point but this seems to upset some people so I will stop and go away for a while
Al

 

[Frank Hardly]

Thank goodness for that. I just read 470 pages of dialogue re the Hugo as I sold my QuteHD and ordered a Hugo for arrival on Monday. You are mildly entertaining Al, but your unlimited budget skews your pov relative to the rest of us schmucks who are trying to find that compromise between budget and sound without having our wives geld us. Your insistence on progressively picking holes in this item is becoming a bit odious. I loved the QuteHD and became convinced that the relative value of the Hugo was good and gave me a step up. I sold my AP 1 with Pure Power to finance this item and am really looking forward to it. I love good things in small packages. Maybe you need to lurk in another subset of audiodom - one for the insanely rich or plain insane who are looking for the absolute best with no consideration for money. 
I digress briefly and observe that in 470 pages I learned the following:
Some think the Hugo is a game changer and others don't
Some think its bright and others don't
Some thinks it should be bigger and have a bigger power supply - others don't
Some think it works well with HD800 -others don't
 
Probably the most useful thing I learned from the 470 pages is that Audioquest makes a Usb b to micro adapter. $10 from my local audio shop.
Live free and prosper

 

[ALRAINBOW]

If you read my entire posts bot of them I like the product very much and it's not hiw much it cost either jut read and you will understand. And as dsd gets more popular or you start using it you will see why I said what I did.

Good nite all.

 

[Frank Hardly]

Half my library is Dsd/dsf rips of SACD's. Some sounded revelatory and sublime on the Qute - others sound mediocre. My observation is that this is not so much machine related, but the quality of the original recording.

 

[Sonic77]

  Sonic, you dont quite get my point. The speakers were $75K the monblocs were $150K and the rest of the gear made up the difference. The TT was a reconstructed vintage and was in my estimate about $30K.
 
It was not the TT that made the difference though, as not every album was the same. Herve played a CD and then the same vinyl album to demonstrate the difference. I then remarked that vinyl has crackles and I prefer the silence of CDs and then he put on the Supertramps made of some special material and it retained all the analog goodness and was silent as a CD! That vinyl album was better than CD in every single way.
 
Again, just wait till the QBD updated with Hugo type digital comes out and you will see the true desktop potential of the current Chord/Watts development. I am not sure that ANY digital could beat what I heard off that Supertramp album though...and I am still in the digital camp (it is still the future and will get better). Vinyl is too much hassle. LoL

You missed my point I wasn't even talking about cd's
I can't wait for QBD Hugo home version, I just hope it costs less then the Direct Stream Dac, so that more of us regular Joes can enjoy that one as well, also I prefer buying from Chord rather then PS Audio, but that's my preference.
I have boxes of LP's and enjoy records, but your right, compared to Computer audio it gets to be a hassle fast. (Man how times have changed.)

 

[bpcans]

Couldn't agree more - well said.

 Al seems to be looking for the uber-DAC while the rest of us are thrilled silly to get this sort of performance for reasonable money, No small irony that some of the Hugo's harshest critics cant understand why anyone would spend this kind of money on a 'portable DAC', despite the fact that many of them have never even heard it - and we have Al at the other end of the spectrum bitching about the fact that it doesnt cater to his particular niche despite being thousands of dollars cheaper than most of the products currently filling that niche. Portable or no, I cant see why someone who is so clearly invested in desktop gear would hang onto a DAC that clearly isnt doing it for him. 

ALRAINBOW can relieve his pain and suffering by selling his Chord to me at a proper head-fi members price.

 

[wisnon]

  You missed my point I wasn't even talking about cd's
I can't wait for QBD Hugo home version, I just hope it costs less then the Direct Stream Dac, so that more of us regular Joes can enjoy that one as well, also I prefer buying from Chord rather then PS Audio, but that's my preference.
I have boxes of LP's and enjoy records, but your right, compared to Computer audio it gets to be a hassle fast. (Man how times have changed.)

LoL
 
Finally we agree!!!!! I would rather the QBD-Hugo than the DS (based on my own projection of the future).
 
OK, you were talking bout Hirez PCM files. LoL. Touche, but still you know that I think DSD is better! LoL. PCM Hirez is great though and even well recorded RBCD is superb.