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Chord DAVE alternatives?

Hello fellow 'goners.

Yesterday I had the pleasure of listening to the Raidho C1.1 and D1 paired with bryston 28 (the latest ones) mono blocks, a zanden pre, and chord dave. While the synergy was amazing I was mostly there to listen for a possible speaker upgrade, however (as these things usually go) the chord dave caught my eye. Right now, most of my music is digital and I am using a fostex hpa8 as a dac. I usually do toslink out from my Astell player or macbook pro as I found it to be less finicky than usb (different laptops were sounding different).

1. the chord dave is very far outside my budget. if i were to "upgrade" dacs are there more reasonably priced alternatives? i want to capture that tone and timber and spacing but understand that i can't have all that the dave offers. will the qute/qute ex/qute hd be a nice step up from my current dac?

2. the dealer said toslink was no good - any suggestions on what i should use instead?
skanda
5 responses Add your response
ampus
33 posts
 
I compared Mojo with DAVE.  To my ears (and a few others) Mojo gives you at least 80 - 90% of DAVE's performance.  

If your dealer carries DAVE, he should also carry Mojo, Hugo, Hugo TT, and qute2.  You should listen to all and decide for yourself.

Your dealer is not correct about Toslink.  Rob Watts, Chord DAC designer, recommends USB, followed by Toslink connection.  Many people have tried both and agree that USB is better than Toslink, but not by a far margin.
wisnon
700 posts
 

Standard SS rectified Lampizator Atlantic with Superclocks on the USB will be about $6K. You can have it with Tube rectifier for a bit more than the standard price.

R2R ladder Dac with PCM384khz and DSD256.

It’s a killer!


 I have a demo unit now and its super impressive.


I own a Qute EX and it's far below the DAVE and the Atlantic.

naimfan
166 posts
 
Although there is a significant performance jump to DAVE, I think the Hugo TT is excellent, and the best "value" in the Chord lineup above the Mojo (which is extremely good for a $600 DAC). 


milpai's avatar
milpai
2,402 posts
 
Naimfan,
Would you know if the Hugo TT internally converts the incoming DSD to PCM before converting to analog?
skanda OP
60 posts
 
milpai, i believe the fpga structure converts the dsd. i am fairly positive but ive been reading about so many dacs that i may be mixed up.

just coming back to this now because i bought the c1.1 and am letting my system settle down (along with my expenses!). i never thought my system could sound _this_ good. but let's push it further.

the lampizator atlantic, lite 7, and schiit yggdrasil all have my eyes. are the lampi's too warm? i like the idea of being able to roll 300b's in the lite 7 but i think as much as i romanticize the idea...i seem to really enjoy a hyper detailed high resolution sound (without any sibilance of course). would the yggdrasil suit me better?

also my local dealer is offering me a chord qbd76 as a 1-to-1 trade with my dynaudio contour 1.4le. is this dac behind the times or does it still have some magic?
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