UNOE
500+ Head-Fier
Here's my take on the Poly. Before I begin, I would just like to make it clear that I have nothing but respect for Chord's products. I do not have experience with the higher end stuff, but the Hugo and the Mojo have impressed me so much, and I absolutely love them. A couple of trained engineers I know who happen to be audio enthusiasts also have nothing but praise for Rob Watts and the stuff he says regarding his technology. I do not claim however, to be fully versed in the techy side of things.
I was really, really looking forward to the Poly, and i to be honest the pricing was quite a shock to me, and I was rather disappointed, because I could not see myself forking that money out for a transport which only works for the mojo. I do not doubt what John has said about the mojo, that it is technologically advanced and difficult to engineer. However, I personally (and probably many others who are unhappy about the price), find it difficult to justify that the technology in the poly is worth more than the technology of the mojo. Sure, it's probably also true that the Mojo could have been priced much higher, but the fact is that it isn't.
I think the main reason why people are unhappy with the price, is this. The mojo was deliberately priced as such, by Chord, to make it a product for the masses. Mind you it's cheap only to us crazy fanatics, but nonetheless, it was extremely fairly priced, and we have nothing to complain about. Problem here, is that people who buy the mojo buy it expecting to have a reasonably priced solution to fantastic portable sound. Now, buying the poly requires them to not just top up, but more than double what they would pay in total, and the whole package is not at a price that most mojo owners are willing and able to pay. It almost feels like it's going against the whole idea of having amazing sound made affordable and reachable.
That said, I am in no way criticising chord, or any of their products, simply the pricing of the Poly. That's all. I've not completely put off the poly at this point, and will still be extremely interested should it really sound far better than any DAP on the market as a transport, but I find the pricing rather too high at this point. In any case, I still do hope the poly is a success and would still love to try it.
I also believe with their FPGA technology they have not fully tapped into sells of the masses that's they could. They could offer a FGPA powered off a phone, with processing power that is fraction of the mojo speed yet still have enough processing power to run circles around Dacs like DFR or any other dac on market besides the mojo.