[Amberlamps]

I worry about the life of the super-capacitors if leaving it on all the time.

If they blow up, you can probably get the same ones from aliexpress, it would be easy to unsolder the fxd ones and replace with new ones. But, make a throw away email account, as you will be bombarded with "I love you two times baby"' and "please save my life for the low low price of £2.50" etc etc emails.

Did I mention that I also play russian roulette, with a colt M1911

 

[dawktah2]

Nope. Consider electrostats on a completely different system that need an amp designed for them, typically 200 volts and higher. That said, you can use the TT2 as the DAC going in to the electrostat amp.

Are you familiar with energizers? https://wooaudio.com/amplifiers/wee

That's the one! I'm not sure if I'm reading specs right...? 3 watts minimum.

 

[jarnopp]

That's the one! I'm not sure if I'm reading specs right...? 3 watts minimum.

It seems like it should. @Rob Watts? Also, wondering if anyone has already tried and can address the better transparency and detail of stats vs loss in transparency from adding a component.

 

[dawktah2]

It seems like it should. @Rob Watts? Also, wondering if anyone has already tried and can address the better transparency and detail of stats vs loss in transparency from adding a component.

I listened to, Mr. Speakers at the time, VOCE at CanJam, London. I liked the way they sounded. I don't have an energizer so wouldn't want to buy a Blue Hawaii. I'm always at a disadvantage due to lack of dealers near me. Would love to audition, I transport my TT2 in a case so I can take with.

 

[CreditingKarma]

But the Bartok is more like Dave plus Mscaler in terms of price. The Dave plus Mscaler bests the TT2 plus Mscaler (which indeed it does by a hefty margin) so did you compare that to the Bartok? The dCS is also going up in price and after September will be £13,200 for the headphone version hence why I think it ought to be lined up against Dave and not to TT2.

Yes I compared it against the Dave and mscaler combo too. I prefered the Bartok I don't want to rehash what I said earlier here in detail. The three of us that were there when we had the Dave mscaler combo, Bartok and fully upgraded MSB premire all prefered the Bartok to the Dave combo.

We actually noticed that the Dave was better without the mscaler for some music too. In the end the MSB was incredible with the Bartok being much closer to the MSB than it was to the Dave. The Bartok is also still cheaper than the Dave and Mscaler when you factor in a streamer and stands.

 

[CreditingKarma]

The headphone amplifier section in it is just marginal.

The headphone section in the TT2 was not stellar with my abyss either. I found that the Formula S was better than the TT2 amp section. That is why I got the Bartok without the headphone amp too. If you don't have an abyss or susvara the amp section of the Bartok is really good. I found it better than the Dave or TT2 with my clears when I had the Bartok with amp for an audition.

But hey to each their own. Chord makes great stuff and I was very happy with my TT2 mscaler combo. It was due to the performance with speakers that made me upgrade to the Bartok.

 

[CreditingKarma]

Price really is irrelevant. A Mojo will drive 8 ohm loudspeakers but Bartok can't drive anything below 33 ohms; a Mojo will reconstruct transients very much more accurately than Bartok's min phase filters; a Mojo has no measurable noise floor modulation which Bartok has a plenty. The ability to drive loads, noise floor modulation and transient accuracy defines how well a DAC amp will perform.

Unfortunately, some people measure based on their wallets, and perceived size and brand recognition - not on the actual musical performance.

If the mojo is truly better then perhaps I should sell my Bartok and get the mojo. But then again the topping d90 measures better than the qutest.
I am pretty sure that most folks would prefer the qutest in a listening test. That is one reason that I don't purchase bases solely based on measurements.

I will say it until the cows come home. Rob you design incredible products and I loved my TT2 and mscaler. It just happened that i prefered the sound of a product from another company. When I move into a new house I might pick up another TT2 or Dave for a second headphone only system.

The only request would be to please include the stand with the Dave it looks soo much better in the stand. I know that is not a thing that you have any control over though.

Stay safe and healthy.

 

[radnor]

Numbers always tells the complete engineering story - it just depends on what numbers and how they are put together and one's interpretation of the numbers! And of course, there is no accounting for personal taste - something for which numbers don't represent.

rob... do you have a theory why vlad at the verge gave hugo 2 such a terrible review? its somewhat mind boggling to me.

 

[Triode User]

rob... do you have a theory why vlad at the verge gave hugo 2 such a terrible review? its somewhat mind boggling to me.

I have a theory and it relates to generating extra traffic by being controversial.

 

[Hooster]

Price really is irrelevant. A Mojo will drive 8 ohm loudspeakers but Bartok can't drive anything below 33 ohms; a Mojo will reconstruct transients very much more accurately than Bartok's min phase filters; a Mojo has no measurable noise floor modulation which Bartok has a plenty. The ability to drive loads, noise floor modulation and transient accuracy defines how well a DAC amp will perform.

Unfortunately, some people measure based on their wallets, and perceived size and brand recognition - not on the actual musical performance.

Having owned a Mojo I just have to scratch my head after reading this. I know exactly what a Mojo sounds like. After I got my current (non portable) DAC and listened to it I put my Mojo in it's box and sold it. There was no comparison in terms of sound. I won't go into build quality, value for money or styling since I have nothing complimentary to say about the Mojo in any of these respects.

Price really is irrelevant. I have an old refurbished phone, an LG V20 and to me even that sounds far better than the Mojo and it costs way less. It also runs Android, has a screen and can stream music without any silly add on devices.

 

[Rob Watts]

Rob, how many volts is -5L ( or rather 0L) through rca ?

2.4v RMS for -5L. 0L will clip with 0dBFS input; but 0H would be 4.2v RMS.

Rob, thanks for replying.

Leaving it on 24/7 shortens the life of the tt2?

The sound tests between the DAC / AMP modes I did with my Supernait3. I am not talking about driving the speakers directly from the RCA / XLR outputs. So according to you, it shouldn't change the sound but it did. Could the high gain in AMP mode change the sound and in low gain not change?

The only worry are the super-caps. But since they are run at low voltage, with low temperature, I calculated the life and it came to an extraordinary figure - 500,000 hours for a 50% reduction in capacitance. That's 50 years... Something else will fail before then. Electronics fail with on/off surges and temperature cycling, so keeping it on actually helps reliability, if you use it every day.

rob... do you have a theory why vlad at the verge gave hugo 2 such a terrible review? its somewhat mind boggling to me.

There is no accounting for taste!

I have a theory and it relates to generating extra traffic by being controversial.

I have noticed that 9 to 12 months after all the rave reviews come out, we will sometimes get a wobbly one, going against the grain.

 

[Articnoise]

Everyone know that Topping rule them all measures great too .

 

[Articnoise]

There is no accounting for taste!

[/QUOTE]

Are you really sure? We have good taste and we have bad taste. I'm not kidding .

 

[rkt31]

Bartok is going yggy way. You would find a number of members in every forum that we did this and that and it beat Dave (no need to say why it is done ) . Not long ago a comparison was posted of Dave +m scaler with msb select and recordings were posted on chord fb page . Msb was clearly sounding shouty and dirty and the msb owner was like 'why I spent so much on msb' after he listened Dave combo. Everyone knows what happened to yggy ,totaldac and ps audio direct stream. You can't hide digital shortcomings through analog design, there is no way you can do that. If at all one likes some kind of distortion there are other ways to get that. Best would be to listen fm or am radio, it will have more poor measurements. Also measuring the affect of long tap length is not possible after a certain limit of tap length with current equipments. But brain is sensitive even to slightest of timing errors. IMHO it is difficult to compare dacs through headphones because headphones can't project image in front of you. Depth and image through headphones can only be experienced "over your head" which actually is highly perceptible through chord dacs. This may fool your brain into believing of less width. Believe me if you are not habitual it can be a completely different experience than other dac +headphone amp combo. In a well set speaker set up ( with accurate toe in ) the depth and image projected by chord dacs is like a live performance. Timbre, tonality and focus of instruments and voice is unmatched. Imo those comparing Dave combo with other dacs ( any other dac of their choice ) should record analog out and post on any forum of their choice.

 

[OPMBCN]

The only worry are the super-caps. But since they are run at low voltage, with low temperature, I calculated the life and it came to an extraordinary figure - 500,000 hours for a 50% reduction in capacitance. That's 50 years... Something else will fail before then. Electronics fail with on/off surges and temperature cycling, so keeping it on actually helps reliability, if you use it every day.

Awesome! thank you

Regarding DAC / AMP mode, can you tell me why the sound difference occurs?

When using Roon, is it preferable to use WASAPI or AISO? it also sounds somewhat different.