[ray-dude]

Sorry, I should have posted here as well. The right jack was busted when I received it as well. I let Todd know privately.

 

[Alcophone]

Sorry, I should have posted here as well. The right jack was busted when I received it as well. I let Todd know privately.

Sorry, could have asked you as well - but wanted to make sure Todd and the others know.

 

[Alcophone]

 

[ngoshawk]

My (very reluctant) Mojo+Poly+Case review. Please see the preamble below for details. I look forward to a chance to revisit this review once Chord has had a chance to address the functionality and stability gaps in the current offering.




Disclaimer: The Poly, Mojo, and case described below was provided by TTVJ Audio as part of a demo tour, in exchange for posting an honest review when I was done with the unit. The loaner unit has been sent along to the next person in the tour (thank you @TTVJ !). No other consideration was given nor received.

PREAMBLE: This review was conducted and written without knowing any of the backstory on the Poly other than the CES launch info a year ago. I was unaware at the launch issues and software gaps that the current version of the software has. I wanted to reflect the experience of an interested but uninformed buyer. The review is based on version 1.0.4 of the software, which is missing significant features, and the iOS configuration app was not available at the time of the review. I have since learned that Chord has a series of releases targeted to address these shortcomings, of which the first was released today. I have passed the Poly on to the next person so I can’t assess, but it will be many releases/weeks before the feature set is complete and stable.

All the challenges I cite are addressable with software updates, but it is important that people have realistic expectations if they're jumping in now vs later. Please consider this review a snapshot in time, and look to more recent reviews to chart progress as Chord addresses the critical feature and functionality gaps that they have acknowledged. Once the software has stabilized, I may have an opportunity to rereview the Poly. Regardless I am planning on removing or at least heavily editing this review once the product is stable (or update it if I have access to rearview the unit), since the bulk off my criticisms have to do with the incomplete nature of the product as of today.



Background

I own a Chord Mojo and DAVE (and soon Chord Blu2), and I’m full on addicted to the Chord sound, and the intoxicating effect of what I call the Chord Magic: music feels real and physical, and the emotionality of the performance becomes tangible. I use my Mojo at the office and on the go, and I use my DAVE when at home. I’m also all in on Roon, and have two Roon end points at home (2 channel setup and my outdoor speakers) and a Roon end point at work. If there is an opportunity to get the Chord sound with a Roon end point while on the go, and maybe streamline my lossless and high res music content management so I have access to it everywhere? Count me in!

When Chord made their CES announcements in January 2017, I was blown away:

Rob's technical brief on the M scaler in the Blu2 was phenomenal. The Blu2 looks like an industry changer, and after WAY too long waiting for mine, I hope to have it soon so I can finally hear it in my home setup. The technical achievement with the blu is otherworldly, and we're only years away from that trickling down to the consumer products. Wow.

The Hugo 2 is also a phenomenal leap forward for the price point, and the closest you can get to a portable DAVE. Very clear value story, and the reality of the Hugo2 was awesome (see my extensive review of Mojo vs Hugo2 vs DAVE: https://www.head-fi.org/showcase/chord-hugo-2.22209/reviews#review-19435)

The odd duck out was the Chord Poly. When it was announced, I got the high level concept, but I was very confused who it is for, what (in detail) it does and why it is better than other options, and had far more questions than answers. What I wanted was a clear articulation of core use cases, detailed discussion of differentiation, and what problems it solves for whom.

When the price was announced and the inevitable backlash hit, I checked out from following the Poly. I figured I would come back to it when it was real, and see what the reality was. The long delays and frequent postponements of releases and “free case wars” and (apparent) extensive flame fests in the Poly thread have made me feel good about this decision.

So now that the Poly is here, what is it all about? Having side stepped (and intentionally avoided as much as possible) much of the drama of the past 9 months, I’m able to come to the Poly with an open mind, with not expectations other than what I see on the Chord website and what I saw in those first CES announcements. I’m grateful to the good folks at TTVJ Audio for providing a loaner Poly setup so I can revisit this odd duck, and see if there is a place for it in getting the Chord sound while on the go.


Philosophy

I wrote extensively about my current outlook on music, test tracks, and what I listen for in my recent Hugo2 vs Mojo vs DAVE review (https://www.head-fi.org/showcase/chord-hugo-2.22209/reviews#review-19435) Rather than repeat here, I refer you there.

My key use cases for a Poly (and future 2Go if I get a Hugo2) are:

• Convenient Roon endpoint when at the office (replacing my current RasberryPi Roon Bridge that I connect and disconnect to my Mojo)
• High quality streaming and content playback when on the go (no laptop, via phone)
• Convenient Roon endpoint when I’m home (for future, if I replace my DAVE with a BluHugo2 + 2Go setup)

What I’m not interested in:

• Airplay or Bluetooth or any other lossy streaming format

What I’m curious about:

• Loading up a SD card with my high res content so I have my high res content (currently at home only) available wherever I go

Hardware

Source setup:

• MacBook Pro and Mac Mini, running latest OS X, content on local SSD, running Roon 1.3
• iPhone X, running latest iOS 11 ($priceless)

Headphone setup

• Sennheiser HD800 (with SR mod) ($800 used)
• MrSpeakers Aeon Flows headphones (closed) ($800)
• Noble Katana CIEMs ($1600)

Content

• ~300GB of lossless Redbook and ~1TB of high res audio files on my home server, accessible via iTunes, Plex, and Roon Server
• ~300GB of lossless Redbook and some selective high res files on my laptop, accessible via iTunes and Roon Server
• ~100GB of 256kbps compressed music on my iPhone
• TIDAL HiFi for streaming (via Roon on laptop and home server, and via Tidal app on iPhone)

First Things First: Lots and Lots of Photos




Physical Impressions

As you can see, it is a handsome package. If you love the Mojo, you’ll love the Poly. It is a perfect match, and comes together very cleanly. I’d be leary of having the Mojo connected to the Poly without any support. If feels like it could get caught in a bag and split off the plastic pins and USB connectors. The Chord case (or equivalent) is a must I think. The case is quite nice as well, giving the package an elegant loo and feel. It is hard plastic with a soft lining, and I’m confident it offers excellent protection for the unit. Given the nature of the case material, I would expect it to pick up scratches and scuffs like a magnet, so OCD folks should convince themselves that the weathering is part of the charm


Initial Setup

As usual, unboxing was a lot of fun, and it is always a pleasant surprise to see how compact the Mojo is (and the Poly even more so). But right away, I’m confronted by a pack in “Setup guide” from the Chord US distributor. Uh oh.

I adore Chord’s technology and will buy anything Rob Watts designs sight unseen (note: Rob did not design the Poly, but he did design the Mojo), but the usability and industrial design sensibility for what goes around that tech continues to be a bit tone deaf. (Who designs a product that requires a separate pin to operate? Why not have a recessed button?)

After assembling the unit (nice feel, and great in the case), I charged it overnight. First step was setting it up, so time to download the GoFigure iOS app. After a bunch of searching to no avail (Chord site is unhelpful), the Google tells me it isn’t released yet (!). (I guess I should have fully read the insert sheet from the US distributor). Time to get out my keyring with the magic pin and configure the unit via WiFi.

If you have headphones on when fiddling with the keyring config thing, Poly talks to you and tells you what is happening. To get into access point mode (make your Poly into a WiFi access point so you can connect to it), you need to hold the keyring thingie in for several seconds.

I was able to connect to the Poly network from my Mac, but unable to connect to anything (the secret poly.audio address didn’t work and even going directly to the Poly IP address didn’t give me anything). To get access, I needed to connect to it via my iPhone,, at which point the “login” page for the Poly WiFi network popped up, allowing me to configure the Poly (note to the Chord software team: typically you connect to a network, then access a web server on that network to configure things). Note, there is almost 2 full screens of small font marketing copy extolling the build quality of a product you’ve already purchased that you have to scroll through to get to the actual configuration options…keep scrolling, you’ll get there.

Once at the Poly configuration page (aka, login screen), I configured it for Roon playback in bit perfect, and entered the SSID and password for my home 2.4GHz WiFi network (no drop down to select from). After saving, the Poly rebooted, and it became visible on my network as an (uncertified) Roon end point. Couple clicks in Roon, and I was playing music (huzzah!).

After looking up the IP address of the Poly on my home WiFi router config page, I tried to connect to it to fiddle some more with configuration options. Alas, no dice. Looks like you have to put the unit into AP mode (no more music…boo!) and connect direct to the Poly. Pro tip: when you put your Poly in AP mode, it takes a little while for the Poly WiFi network to become visible (is it rebooting?)…be patient. Chord software team: this is why you want a password protected admin web server on the unit with some auto discovery…check out how the excellent Sonicorbiter SE config system works.

So now I’m in a pickle: how can I configure my Poly to connect to my phones WiFi network, when I need my phone to connect to the Poly’s WiFi network to configure things? Let’s connect to the Poly login screen from my phone and input my phone’s hotspot SSID and password blind. After clicking “Reboot on save” for the Nth time and hitting Save (yes, it doesn’t remember that you want to reboot on Save…why not just have a “Save and reboot” button?) Poly reboots and connects to my home’s WiFi network. How do I get it to prioritize my phone’s network over my home network, other than turning off my home network or deleting it from the Poly? Time to take a break before going too deep into this rabbit hole.

Some time passes, and I have a couple hours to kill at my local Starbucks. Perfect opportunity to continue with my effort to get the Poly to connect to my phone’s WiFi hotspot. After a couple tries, fiddling with when I’m at my phones personal hotspot page and when I turn on the MojoPoly, I can connect to my phone hotspot! I switch my laptop over to my phone’s hotspot, and I can see the Poly Roon end point again, and play music (huzzah!)

Next challenge: Can I connect both the MojoPoly and my laptop to the Starbucks public WiFi network so I’m not eating up my data on my phone while listening to Tidal? Alas, that means time to turn off the music while I use the pin thingie to put the Poly in AP mode to fiddle with network configs on the Poly. I get back to the Poly config/login page from my phone. Alas, you can’t add a network without a password, so no dice connecting to the Starbucks network (or I’m assuming any public WiFi network for that matter)

How about the Poly as a hotspot? Some how I randomly got the unit into hotspot mode (it told me so when I checked status with the pin, reading up in the forums afterwards it happened when I was trying to put it into AP mode and didn’t hold the pin in long enough). Connecting my laptop to the Poly WiFi still doesn’t bring up the config/login page, but I see the Roon end point and can play music from my local laptop drive (yay!) but no Tidal since I don’t have internet access from my laptop any more (boo!) Time to fiddle with bridging networks? Damn, that’s a lot of work compared to plugging the Mojo into my laptop using a USB cable. Still, this would be the ideal config when you’re on an airplane.

Maybe having my music content on a local micro SD card will make a difference. Alas, the largest card readily available is 256GB (with 400GB coming, if you can stomach the cost), so that doesn’t help me get my high res content mobile. Why the Poly has a single microSD slot (vs SD slot or multiple microSD slots) is unclear to me; size and weight are flexible variables with a device of this size. The Mojo is a world class DAC, that demands lossless content and high res content. There can never be enough storage.


Listening Impressions: At Home from Laptop and Home Server

This configuration is very clean, making the Mojo into a standard Roon end point: come home, plug the MojoPoly into USB power, and plug it into your 2 channel setup or some headphones, and you’re cooking with Roon gas. Solid Roon endpoint, very convenient, just works once you get past the initial setup headaches.

I did not evaluate the quality of the Poly as a Roon endpoint (vs Sonicorbiter SE vs direct USB connection to Roon Server). Even with the DAVE, sonic differences in Roon endpoints is very subtle for me, so I’m not sure it is reasonable to be worried about this level of optimization for an awesome portable DAC like the Mojo.

MojoPoly is a winner as a Roon-enabled endpoint combined with a world class DAC.


Listening Impressions: At the Office from Laptop

This is a no go for me, since my office does not have a 2.4GHz WiFi network. I would need to connect to a hotspot on my phone, and reconnect every time I leave my office for a meeting and come back (connection gets dropped). Unfortunately, this is much less convenient than just plugging a Mojo into the USB into my Raspberry Pi based Roon Bridge (~$50) in my office (2 USB cables to the RaPi, vs 1 USB cable and fiddling with iPhone hotspot screens every time I come back to my office and need to reconnect with the MojoPoly). There needs to be a better story here, or at least a better way to have the Poly reconnect to your phone’s hotspot automatically.


Listening Impressions: On the Go from Laptop and Phone

This configuration has the advantage of only requiring to connect to my phone’s hotspot once (vs multiple times at the office as I leave and come back to my office), but content management for playback is awkward. If I’m playing Tidal or iTunes on the go with my phone, I need to reconfigure the Poly to “Other”. When I settle in somewhere and pop open my laptop and want to play content from Roon (local and Tidal), I need to reconfigure the Poly to “Roon” and restart it. Even then, by having to connect the Poly to my phone’s WiFi, I can’t take advantage of any public WiFi, so I’m using cellular data whenever I’m away from a home/work network.

Until there is a quick and painless way to switch the Poly back and forth from “Other” to “Roon” (<5 seconds, no stupid pin, etc), or better still, figure out how not to have a Roon vs Other mode, the schlep just isn’t worth it. Hopefully the iOS config app will address this when it is out.

While on the move, having my Mojo connect via WiFi to my phone is a lot more convenient than short USB cables and rubber bands, but the Poly commands a pretty hefty premium (cost and effort to switch and reconfigure networks) to pay for that convenience.


No Longer Beginners Mind

Having gone through this process end to end, I’ve gone back and dug into the Poly thread on Head Fi. Chord seems to be working very hard on software releases to address various issues I’ve been seeing, and many others that people have been talking about there. As a software guy who also grits his teeth and does hardware, my empathy and sympathy for what the engineers at Chord are working through is off the charts. This stuff is crazy hard without the internet going all crazy over you. Respect to the Chord team for taking on the issues one by one, and staying engaged through the flames. I urge everyone to have patience as the engineers do the hard work of getting the features done and shipped.


Conclusions

The Poly (as of late November 2017) is frustratingly incomplete product. The pieces are there for something awesome, but it hasn't jelled yet. If the standard is “It Just Works”, the Poly in its current 1.0 configuration fails to meet that standard at seemingly every opportunity. In a fair world, all reviews of the product would be postponed until the Chord engineering team has a chance to actually finish the product. For better or worse, the product has shipped and I have the loaner unit now, so please consider these impressions as a snapshot in time as the product works toward what should have been its initial release.

I’m hopeful a lot of the crazy config awkwardness goes away when the GoFigure iOS configuration app is released, but I need to send the loaner along its way to the next person. I delegate to others on the tour to post updates once the GoFigure app is available.

Hardware is crazy hard, and mobile hardware many times more so. Thankfully the only What hardware decision with the Poly (the config button that requires a separate tool) is hopefully addressed once the GoFigure configuration app is available.

The real head scratcher is that so many of the challenges with the Poly seem to be software related. For a product announced and demonstrated 11 months ago, this level of software hackery is worrisome. When hardware is as delayed as the Poly has been, that is usually an opportunity for the software teams to kick serious ass and build out great experience. If there is any saving grace to these challenges, it is just software, so there is a path to dig out of this hole. With the rapid train of releases queued up, they may have made changes already, and the team deserves a chance to dig out of a very bad situation.

Even with these early product 1.0 challenges, the MojoPoly is a winner on a home network as a Roon endpoint, and I’ll take it on faith that it (eventually) will make a serviceable smartphone managed DAP if you can fit all your music content on a single microSD card. The other streaming options are all compromised audio (Bluetooth, AirPlay, etc) or require your phone to be off the internet to connect to the Poly hotspot via WiFi, or off public WiFi for the Poly to connect to your phone WiFi hotspot. Having the only convenient streaming on the go be lossy for me defeats the purpose of having a world class portable DAC like the Mojo.

Doing 10 things to 80% utility doesn’t make you better than doing 2 things that really matter to 100% utility. For a premium product from a company that has consistently blown away the rest of the industry for world class performance for comparatively reasonable prices, the Poly is unfortunately not ready for prime time. As a (soon to be) Hugo2 owner that would love to take a portable DAVE everywhere I go, I sincerely hope Chord can leverage their experience with the Poly and figure out what 2 or 3 things the (hopefully soon to be announced) 2Go needs to be 100% good at and knock it out of the park.

To close with something constructive, here is what I would be looking for in a Poly (for my Mojo) or a (yet to be announced) 2Go (for a future Hugo2) to make it a winner for me:

• No requirement for a separate tool to configure and manage the unit (just used a recessed button please, or everything through a config app)
• WiFi support beyond 2.4GHz (yes I know it needs battery and the geo issues…), as well as modern WiFi connectivity support in software to easily get on Home/Public/Corporate networks
• Significantly more local storage options (multiple SD card slots, USB for external storage, etc), suitable for lossless and high res music libraries
• Thoughtfully implemented configuration and management interface (just steal design ideas from what other streaming end point companies do)
• Resist announcing the product until you have beta units in the field, don’t ship it until it is ready, and have no more than 4 months between those events (insane shipping pressure doesn’t help anyone do a quality job)

All of these are addressable with bake time and Moore’s law, and from forum posts, releases are in the pipeline that should help with the most significant issues. If you expect baked products, pretend the Poly isn’t available for sale and be patient (complaining about things not working or being missing doesn’t help if people already know about it). If you’re OK with alpha/beta quality, dive in and have fun and help them get things baked faster. If you haven’t played with Roon before, jump in now and be blown away at how awesome it is to have your Mojo be a Roon end point on your home network (that part is working great).

Some more out of the box suggestions:

• Have an automatic sync function between the internal SD card and a mounted share. Basically, let me mount my music share at home, and have the Poly automatically sync the contents to the SD card for when I’m on the go
• Get out of the software business, and open source the software for the Poly; Chord’s secret sauce is in their DACs. Make margin on the hardware, but let the community drive software innovation (I guarantee that we collectively are better at this than a small company can afford to be...give the community a chance to to help you realize a "Chord Everywhere" vision)

tl;dr

It is too soon to be doing a proper review of the Poly (software just isn’t ready for prime time, still needs a couple more weeks/releases). Unless you enjoying bleeding edge alpha releases, hold off on purchasing the Poly until Chord has had a chance to go through a couple software update cycles. I hope to have an opportunity to revisit the Poly once it is able to really show off what it can do.

A most excellent write up, one I perused to familiarize myself with the incoming gear. Congratulations!

 

[Alcophone]

Mojo/Poly/Case Review

Mojo

It may have been an article on The Verge that first made me aware of the Chord Mojo, it may have been something else, but its outstanding reputation is undeniable. Nevertheless, I was immediately skeptical when I saw the funky looking colored balls on this thing, paired with its ~$500 price tag. At the time, I still felt like I splurged by getting the $200 Sound Blaster E5 rather than its cheaper siblings, and the E5 is loaded with features, compared to pretty much any DAC/amp combo out there. How does Chord justify this price tag, I wondered? It must really sound amazing. At the 2017 Head-Fi meet in San Francisco, I finally got a chance to use one in person, thanks to Dan from MrSpeakers, who used a Mojo to drive the AEON. I was surprised by its hefty feel, thanks to its weight but also due to the metal casing, when I expected plastic. Nice! It drove the AEON well, and, unsurprisingly, had no issue with the rather efficient Focal Listen, either. So it worked, but I still didn't get what all the fuss is about. Can you judge a DAC within a few minutes under meet conditions, though? Maybe not.

Now (half a year later), I finally got to use one in more familiar surroundings and with fewer time constraints. I was most interested in its DAC capabilities, so I started out by using it as such, amplified by the Schiit Jotunheim via a 6ft KabelDirekt 3.5mm TRS to stereo RCA cable, driving my newly acquired MrSpeakers Ether C Flow (burned in the week prior without a whole lot of listening in between) via the included 6ft balanced DUM cable. I had heard about the little trick of holding down both volume buttons and then turning it on to set it to line out. For some reason, Chord uses 3V for line out as opposed to the standard 2V, but you can just lower the volume after starting it up in that mode to prevent clipping. If only the shortcut worked - but it didn't. The Mojo always started up with the volume set to the last level used. Bummer! Just be careful with the volume, or you may get really bad sounding clipping. Also, I could only use the left headphone jack because the right one got loose and rattled around in the Mojo's case. I was only the second person in line, but I don't know what kind of usage the Mojo had seen before. Still, this defect isn't exactly trust inspiring.

I felt like electronic music at first and everything sounded just fine - nothing out of the ordinary. I then switched to Chesky's Ultimate Headphone Demonstration Disc and was in awe - all the instruments sounded more natural than I was used to, and the imaging was more believable as well. But here's the question: was it the Mojo, or my new headphones, that elevated my listening to new heights? Not much longer ago I also got the open Ether Flow, that I didn't remember sounding as natural with these particular songs, so my bet was on the Mojo making a difference here. It made sense. That's what a good DAC is supposed to be able to achieve, right? And why would the closed Ether sound more natural than the open one?

The next day, I hooked up both the iFi nano iDSD (via a 3ft KabelDirekt stereo RCA cable) and the Mojo (via the above mentioned 6ft KabelDirekt 3.5mm TRS to stereo RCA cable) to my Schiit SYS, and connected that to the Jotunheim (via a pair of 6in Schiit/Straightwire PYST RCA cables). Occasionally, I came back to my desk having forgotten which DAC I had last enabled, getting closer to a blind audition. Twice I was convinced that I was listening to the Mojo due to how natural the instruments sounded, and then checked, and... it was the iDSD all along. Oops. Switched back to the Mojo... no change.

To make a long story short: I don't hear a difference between these two DACs (when using the same amp). I find this confusing and worrying, as it seems that I should hear one - this is a Chord DAC after all. Chord DACs are better than everything else, say the believers, except maybe for some multibit competition from Schiit, and possibly DACs in even more outrageous price ranges than the Chord DAVE. I'm planning on getting a Schiit Yggdrasil next - am I actually going to hear a difference? I don't know which metal my ears are made from, but apparently it ain't gold.

How about Mojo + Jotunheim vs. just Mojo, then? I only have the balanced DUM cable for my Ether, so I had to use a 3.5mm TRS to 4-pin XLR adapter cable to test this. The Mojo does a great job here, I struggled to find a difference in sound. Nevertheless, the Jotunheim has the upper hand in more bass heavy content, sounding a bit more controlled and tight than the Mojo. Nevertheless, the Mojo is definitely capable enough to enjoy the Ether on the go, if one were so inclined.

As you can see, I'm not the best at identifying and describing differences between devices, so let's talk more about the Mojo itself from now on.

First, you have to charge it. The included USB type A to micro B cable is extremely short, so you may have to supply your own charging cable. Apparently the LED is glowing white when charging and turns off when it's done. But the LED is below the port, and so you can't see it unless you flip over the Mojo. Sadly, the LED is also recessed, and since this white LED is really a combination of red, blue and green LEDs, depending on the angle the light looks more blue-ish than white. Just ignore that, I guess.

Okay, once charged I tried to connect it to my laptop. That's when I noticed that the micro USB ports are upside down - and you even have to flip one end of the short cable to make it work. I thought about it a little bit and it makes more sense when using the Mojo with a phone, with the cable doing a U turn. But if that's what it's for, then why not include a cable with a connector that phones actually use? Of course, that would mean at least four cables, in reality (USB type A, micro USB, USB-C and Lightning), so I guess they went with the universal solution and left the adapter choice to the user. Can't expect too much at $500, I suppose, though it's certainly better for the environment this way.

Speaking of mobile, the Mojo seems quite power hungry. I have rarely seen my phone's battery drain as quickly. The iFi nano iDSD seems less power hungry, and the Sound Blaster E5 has its host mode where it charges the phone, not the other way round.

Alright, so let's get to the buttons... or orbs... or whatever. They rotate! Fun! And useless, there's no function to them rotating, they just do. Having the Mojo oriented so that its logo is the right way around, the buttons are on top of the device. But then their labels aren't visible... and the "+" button is actually the left one of the pair. Maybe you're supposed to look at it from the rear, so you can actually see the labels? But when doing so, the "+" button is still to the left of the "-" button. With volume knobs, if you turn them counter-clockwise (i.e. make the indicator go left), it gets less loud. When you turn them clockwise (i.e. make the indicator go right), it gets louder. So in my mind, the "-" button belongs on the left side, and the "+" button belongs on the right. But in the country Chord is from, they also drive on the wrong side of the road, so I was foolish to expect anything else, I suppose. The LEDs here are not in the orbs, but below them, so with certain unfortunate viewing angles, the colors are hard to make out, or seem to bleed into the other buttons. But they rotate, so it's totally worth it.

À propos colors. Do me a favor and search for "warning" or "danger" on Google Images. The predominant colors you will see are red and yellow. So when you see the volume buttons glow red (or brown, as the manual calls it), what is the volume set to? To low, the harmless levels, obviously. And at maximum, possibly headphone damaging volume, what color do you get? White. You know, like white doves, white flags and other symbols of peace. Makes total sense. Apparently the color sequence follows that of visible light, ordered by wave length, which I'm sure most humans have memorized, so that's totally what a designer should go for. Followed by putting white at the end, for extra charm.

On Mac OS X Sierra (10.12) and Android Nougat (7.0), incl. USB Audio Player PRO, it works out of the box. On Windows 10, it needs a driver or else it will sound very screwy. I already had installed the driver for Windows 10 Creators Edition when Audio Vision SF briefly let me use the Chord Hugo to audition headphones with. I installed the same driver on my older gaming laptop. The Mojo didn't show up as an ASIO device in foobar2000, which bugged me, so I searched around. Apparently Chord has an ASIO driver available, which I found after some searching. It appears to consist of the normal Windows driver, plus an ASIO driver. I installed that one, and it worked. I then found out that it's the Windows 10 driver prior to the Creators Edition that included the ASIO driver. So why was this working? I hadn't used, and updated, my gaming laptop in a while, and so it wasn't running Creators Edition yet. So for my Surface Pro 4 with the latest Windows 10, there's no ASIO support from Chord. And while ASIO4ALL works well with the Schiit Jotunheim's DAC, it doesn't work well with the Chord Mojo for some reason, producing some nasty artifacts. Let's hope for an update from Chord at some point...

What about the other input options? They work really well! Using a 20ft KabelDirekt Mini TOSLINK to TOSLINK cable, I was able to transmit 24bit, 192 kHz audio without issues from the optical out of my gaming laptop. Using a 15ft KabelDirekt mono RCA cable and an RCA to 3.5mm TS adapter that I bought years ago for 1.36 EUR with shipping, I was able to play a CD from the coax out of my Blu-Ray player. Trying the same with a DVD menu sounded very nasty, probably because the Mojo doesn't understand Dolby audio formats, not even enough to mute them. Using a shorter Vivanco interconnect that I got years ago and the same adapter, I was able to transmit 24bit, 192 kHz audio from the nano iDSD's coax out (no adapter needed on that end) to the Chord Mojo without issues as well. Nice!

Conclusion: a fine DAC and headphone amp wrapped in questionable industrial design that you can get used to, for the most part. Worth 2.5x what the iFi nano iDSD costs? Not to me - but maybe you actually hear a difference, or need optical in/coax in/a second headphone jack, and don't need coax out. As a pure DAC, I couldn't hear a difference between the two, and both weren't too far away from the Jotunheim when compared against it, with the few cans that I have tried (mostly low impedance, medium to high efficiency). I didn't, however, directly compare the amp sections of the iDSD and the Mojo. I do prefer proper volume knobs over funky rainbow colored orbs, both to set the volume and to find out what it's set to.


Poly

Don't even try to use this without reading the manual. And the FAQ. Seriously.

I tried. I charged it, connected it to the Mojo, and turned the Mojo on. The Poly's LED started flashing blue. You know, blue as in Bluetooth. Like the Sound Blaster E5 when it's waiting for a Bluetooth connection. So I tried to connect to it both from my Surface Pro 4 and from my Android phone. One of them asked me for a pin, and I tried 0000 and 1234 without luck. The other simply showed an error message about not being able to connect. Hm. So I consulted the manual, and it mentions a GoFigure app for Android. Alrighty, I searched for that... and found an app not published by Chord. Searched for Chord Electronics... and found some unrelated app. Searched Google... and found out that the app doesn't exist yet. But maybe Chord doesn't know that you can change any file on your website as often as you like, for free, and so they thought they write the PDF manual just once, to be valid some years after releasing the product it describes. Welcome to the twenty-first century!

Also, it turns out that if the LED flashes blue, Poly is searching for a known Wi-Fi network. Sure, whatever. That wasn't gonna work, obviously. Okay, so how do I set up Wi-Fi? By putting a pin into a hole for 5 seconds, duh. Because Chord knows that if you have to work harder to get a reward, it feels like you accomplished more. Clever!

Alright, so now the LED is flashing blue and green in alternation, meaning it's in hotspot mode. And I found a new unsecured Wi-Fi network to connect to. Great! I see two input fields for the Wi-Fi details, one for the SSID and one for the password. Wait, so I have to type the SSID in manually? The Chord Poly costs the same as what I paid for my TV. My TV provides a list of detected Wi-Fi networks that I can simply select, but the Poly makes me type in the name. Okay, sure. I type everything in, messing up when pressing the Enter key and am not sure it worked. The input fields are empty. Hm. So I enter the details again and press Enter more carefully... and get an error message. Using the network debug tools, I see an error code indicating some problem with the name. Oh no, does it not support SSIDs with spaces in them? I wonder how to test this without disrupting connectivity for everyone and everything in my household, so I rename the guest network to something without spaces. And it accepted that. Great. Then I discover the "Manage Connections" menu and see two networks listed. Oh! Guess what, if you type in the same network twice, you get a weird error message. Spaces are actually supported. Suggestion for a better UI: put the list of known networks and the UI to add one on the same page. Display detected networks to make it easier to enter them (especially for people who don't remember the exact name and don't know how to look it up), while still allowing free text entry of the SSID for paranoid audiophiles with hidden networks (don't worry, I mean that lovingly).

Okay, what else. "Choose Your Play Mode". Options are "ROON" and "Other". Well, I don't have Roon, so I changed it to Other, but... why is this a mode at all? Does this have to be mutually exclusive? I'd be very surprised.

Alright, so eventually I got this thing to stop flashing its LED. Regardless of the color, if the LED is on, but not flashing, apparently that means it's connected to a Wi-Fi network, while the color now indicates the charging status. What color do you think indicates a full charge? White, like the Mojo's max volume? Too easy. Purple, like the highest sample rate supported by the Mojo? Haha, silly you. Nah, it's blue. Because blue makes you happy, or something.

Ooookay. So this thing supports DLNA! Great, let's see how I can convince foobar2000 to support that, too. There's a plugin with an awkward UI. But I was able to play an MP3 file this way! Hooray! Then I tried a 24bit, 192 kHz FLAC file and... foobar2000 crashed. Huh. I restarted it, played an MP3... works. Tried a 16bit / 44 kHz FLAC file... crashed again. Maybe it's the app? Switched to Windows Media Player which, to my surprise, actually plays FLAC files. Not on the Poly via DLNA, though. Ah, so you need the 1.06 firmware update to support that... how do I upgrade? I don't, it updates automatically. I was already running 1.06. Alas, no FLAC files. Sadness.

Moving on to AirPlay. Using a MacBook Pro, I was able to connect by simply selecting the Mojo in the little speaker menu in the menu bar, and also in the VOX device list. Tried an MP3 via Spotify and... got choppy audio. Tried an MP3 via VOX and... same thing. Tried a FLAC file and... nothing. Moving on...

Micro SD card support! That sounds like a no hassle solution, just put some music on a card, shove it in and... play random files, I guess? Or maybe you can switch songs with the hypothetical Bluetooth app? Haha, maybe at some point, but right now it's much more complicated. With a micro SD card inserted, the Poly is both a DLNA source and a DLNA renderer. So with a third party app that supports DLNA, and assuming you're on the same network, you can tell Poly to play its offered files, or you can play these files on another DLNA renderer if you're so inclined. That is a flexible solution, I suppose. Sadly, I don't remember whether I got FLAC files to work this way. I certainly didn't get DSD files with .dsf extension to work, they are simply not listed. Not that I care much about DSD, but I was curious. I don't like DLNA. Yeah, it's flexible, but it always feels like a compromise, with its super slow response times to any action you take.

But hey, according to the manual, the Poly is compatible with Spotify! Now, Spotify has amazing multi-device support that works very well, and very quickly - basically as if you're playing from the same device it's running on. So I look for Spotify devices in the app and... see my phone and my laptop... but no Poly. Guess what, the manual lied again, support for that will come with some future update. Uuuugh. That was the one use case for the Poly I could actually get behind.

Conclusion: Why has this been released already? It's not even close to a finished product! Some isolated use cases may work well, but that would have to be way more obvious when buying it to not draw any criticism for it. Rarely have I been so disappointed by a gadget, especially one this expensive. Even if I owned a Mojo, this would be completely useless for me, though it doesn't have to be.


Case

So when you connect Poly and Mojo, you lose the TOSLINK input, you lose the coax input, and you lose the USB input. And the Poly currently only works when you're on the same Wi-Fi network. So if you're using this with your phone, you have to burn some extra battery by running a hotspot on it, and most likely you also have to stop connecting to your company's Wi-Fi, because good look getting the Poly on. That means you'll probably want to remove the Poly rather often, and the case makes that more cumbersome.

So I didn't even try it. It's probably a fine case (for roughly the same price as my pre-owned iFi nano iDSD), though I wouldn't be surprised if Chord messed something up in its design as well, given the above. Hardly a review, I know. Sorry.


Closing statement

The Mojo is the most expensive DAC I have ever been able to use for more than just a few minutes. But even between the cheaper DACs I have, I struggle to hear concrete differences that I could describe. I have heard the Hugo, Hugo TT and Dave as well at some point or another, and a Gungnir Multibit. The latter was the only one where I thought I heard something new that I hadn't heard before, and only with 16bit, 44.1 kHz content, not with higher resolutions. So I'm by no means a DAC expert. Take the subjective part of my review with a gallon of salt.

Despite my negativity, I am grateful for the chance to review these products. Thanks again, @Todd / TTVJ Audio!

 

[AudioBear]

@Alcophone

Thanks for taking the time to put all of this down. I rather like the Mojo but I also liked my ifi micro iDSD a lot too, it was only slightly less portable than Mojo.

You treated Poly more than fairly. It was released too soon; in fact it never should have been released without there GoFigure app. It has trouble qualifying for "beta" status. I have wasted countless hours trying to systematically understand Poly and I have discovered in pretty carefully controlled experiments if you set up a procedure for using it. -- that's right it's not plug and play -- you can get it to work one day and not the next using exactly the same actions in the same order.. Mine at least is inconsistent. I have thought from the beginning that mine has something wrong with it above and beyond what other users are experiencing. In that regard, the fact that there are many users who say Poly works fine makes me wonder what's wrong with mine.

Your commentary opened up a larger discussion and that is one of design philosophy. At $US 700 Poly could have had some additional and/or different features, The lack of other inputs is truly a limitation, but Poly/Mojo was never intended to be used as a stand alone device. It always needs an iPhone or Android phone to control it. I for one question that choice, There are a lot of things that could have been designed differently. It badly needs a physical on off switch and/or a reset button. At the end of the day, it is what it is. Chord made the design decisions; I'm not sure they asked potential users what they wanted. It remains to be seen if new firmware/software will make it work acceptably.

I wouldn't advise anybody to buy Poly right now. I would wait until Chord delivers the long awaited firmware updates and software the GoFigure app. I'd also strongly advise anyone contemplating buying Poly to think about how they will use it and whether it's really what they need. My interest in Poly was solely driven by owning a Mojo which I like. If I didn't own a Mojo, for about the same money I could have purchased any one of a number of stand alone DAPs from Questar, Astell and Kern, Sony and many others. Those actually work and don't need wires or an iPhone. I am particularly intrigued by the idea of using my noise-reducing Sony WH-1000MX2 wireless headphones via their proprietary Hi-Res wireless connection to the new Sony NW-ZX300. I really like the 1000MX2 headphones. Their sound is pretty good and the noise reduction is awesome. I don't need a super audiophile system in an airplane, That said many would be more than happy with this combination. I don't need Poly at home so I don't need many of its features. For me Mojo is portable travel device. Others needs may be different. Of course if I just stop flying in airplanes, my needs will change too. Enough said, I am going to wait and see how this all unfolds,

 

[Alcophone]

Thanks for taking the time to put all of this down. I rather like the Mojo but I also liked my ifi micro iDSD a lot too, it was only slightly less portable than Mojo.

That's a good point, tbe Mojo is a bit more compact, far more pleasant to hold because of its rounded corners, and doesn't require modding to prevent it from scratching the back of my phone, thanks to the built-in rubber feet.

Have you ever compared them directly? I really don't like that I didn't hear a difference

 

[AudioBear]

No I have not compared them directly. I sold the ifi to have cash for Mojo. As I said, it was Mojo's portability that appealed to me. Audio memory is notoriously poor. All I can say is I used the ifi iDSD as a desktop system while I was waiting for a Schiit Gungnir MB and a Cavalli Liquid Carbon to come in. It served me well and sounded very good. I do find the Mojo to be very engaging and pleasant to listen to for long periods of time. Absent a direct comparison I cannot say there is a stunning difference between the two devices and I think that's because the iDSD is vastly underrated. Not taking anything away from Mojo by saying that. Mojo is amazing for it's size. I could live with either. I think ifi would do a lot better if their rethought their design and form factor.

 

[Todd]

Hi All,

The loaner program is still in place and the package is on its way to gsr108 . we have replaced the Mojo with a new one so the headphone jack is no longer an issue.

Todd

 

[ngoshawk]

Excellent, and thank you, @Todd!

 

[ngoshawk]

I am in possession (and checked) of the Mojo/Poly combo. Thank you!

 

[Zadok]

I'll first say thank you to Todd for the ability to participate in this loaner program and try out a set of products I had only read about for awhile, but wanted to try.



Chord Mojo and Poly Review



TL;DR will be in BOLD for easy reading.



General Mindset)



I think it's best to preface that I've never really understood the point of the “mobile rig” that has a bunch of small components daisy chained together into some rubber band tied monstrosity. Handheld DAPs make sense to me as self contained units with high quality components, but to me, a portable setup is not functional if it does not fit within my pant pocket or operate easily from a backpack/briefcase pocket. That's just a personal philosophy for me. With that in mind, I've decided to review the audio separately from the portability.



I've read about people using the Mojo as a standalone desktop solution, and even some review sites like Digital Audio Review rank the Mojo as a comparable DAC to the Bifrost MB, so I want to evaluate the Mojo against my home setup. It has more limited connection options, but those can be worked around pretty easily. I can foresee Mojo by itself already being a solid option for someone who works at a small desk and wants to leave the Mojo at work or in the home office.



When it comes to the Poly, I'm walking into the review with a healthy amount of skepticism on why the device exists at all, but I am open to normal use bringing up situations that I hadn't considered before. Let me explain. Unlike a wireless headphone which has no physical connections, the Pojo combination requires you to be physically tethered between the Mojo and the headphones still. The only part of the audio chain that becomes free is the music selection device, which 90% of the time will be a phone. I came up with two realistic usage situations for Poly before it arrived, and those were 1) keeping Pojo in a bag while you use a phone to select songs or 2) having Pojo be part of a speaker system and using a phone/computer as a remote control.



Arrival and First Look)



The boxes they arrived in were small and minimalist, but well padded. No worries here about the packaging. Not that it would matter anyway because the moment you pick up the Mojo and Poly, you are confident that these two devices could survive a third world war. They feel solid in hand with a good seal between panels and no jostling or loose parts. Both units fit together easily and will not come apart easily, yet do not require a fastener or lock.



The combination case fit snugly and stayed closed easily. It was fairly light and compact enough not to add much tangible bulk to the setup, which was nice. If I had a complaint, it would be that you lose that great feeling of solidity from the base units as the case feels way less durable and premium in comparison (despite adding durability to the system as a whole).



Battery Life. I did not do any stress tests on either unit because, honestly, that's really boring to do and it wasn't really that important to me. What I can tell you is that they never ran out of battery while I was using them. I never felt pressured to rush to a charger or that time was running out. I charged them 3 times while I had them, and even then I probably didn't have to that much.



Audio)



Here's the part I was most excited to learn about during this experience. Like I said earlier, I compared the audio of the Mojo to two different usage scenarios.



The first was against playing music straight from my phone, which had the largest change in performance, especially while using my LCD-3. For audio sources, I used mostly Tidal Hifi with a full range of different genres. The Mojo has what I would call a very pleasant sound signature. To me, it seemed to have an ever so slightly “U” shaped sound signature, but I want to emphasize that it was extremely subtle. It was also a bit dark, but again, very subtle. That being said, the presentation of the sound was what made it an improvement over the Galaxy S7 that I have. With my VMODA m80 headphones (which normally do not require nor benefit much from amplification), the sound became more detailed and clear, but otherwise didn't improve much. The LCD-3, however, showed a large difference. The phone alone felt like it was straining to drive the Audeze, but the Mojo was able to make taking the LCD-3 to a hotel or something feasible. It showed that the Mojo would be a beneficial option for people who wanted to take their mid-fi headphones with them on road trips or airplanes instead of noise-canceling sets.



For my home lineup, I chose the Apex Sangaku (Bought from Todd!) and my Schiit Bifrost gen 1 so that I could compare only single ended sound against the Mojo. This is where I figured out one of my main conclusions about the Mojo and that is that I think the DAC section outclasses the amp section. From my experience with comparing DAC and Amp components, I've found that DAC changes will most greatly affect elements like detail retrieval, instrument separation, and transient clarity. I could sum it up as sound “presence”. For amps, they tend to affect sound “texture” to me. Things like cymbals tickling your ear, bass drums feeling a physical kick, and other seemingly tangible factors of the music. Compared to my Sanaku/Bifrost combo, The Mojo showed very good sound presence, but relatively weak sound texture. I could tell that Chord's FPGA method was doing its job well because transients and note clarity were both present and easily discernible, but they felt hushed and lacked “push”. This made me believe that replacing my Bifrost with the mojo would actually be an upgrade for this system, but I think there are many well priced amps that easily compete against the Mojo (but they are not portable).



Portability and using Poly)



Poly was surprisingly not user friendly when it came to WiFi functionality. The instruction manual was clear about certain steps, but skipped specific key steps with enabling the wifi connection. For example, once connected to the Poly's Ad Hoc wifi network, I was told to bring up the poly's homepage, but the only way I was able to do that was inputting the standard 192.168.1.1 Ip address directly into my browser's text bar, which is something I could figure out as someone who is a nerd and has grown up with computers, but I would rather die painfully than try to explain a step like that to a baby boomer. Beyond that, there were even more steps requiring the network being named and resetting the device. In this day and age, where devices broadcast their presence on networks and have plug-n-play functionality, I was surprised to need all that work to get started.



Perhaps it was my expectations being unrealistic, but I expected poly to be able to work on a network the same way google chromecast can, with a touch of a button, send a signal from a computer/phone to an output device (TV/speakers). Spotify can be controlled on one device and play on another, and I thought the Poly would have support for some sort of Wifi data like that because they are more responsive than bluetooth and have a larger range. It also has battery advantages compared to bluetooth. That's a relatively minor quip as the Poly had workarounds or alternatives to those. Bluetooth was easy and consistent.



My initial hypotheses turned out to be mostly true with my experiences. Poly was distinctly useful two times in my week with it. 1) I brought it to my friend's house while he was having a party, and I used it to play music over his speakers which could play from a 3.5mm jack. 2) I streamed music via bluetooth from my charging phone while I relaxed in bed and fell asleep. Outside those two situations, I could have easily just used the Mojo alone.



Thanks again for this opportunity, and I look forward to writing another review.