I had the Chord TT2 and m-scaler for over a year which sounded excellent. Upgraded to the DAVE in Feb - definitely an improvement over the TT2 but the TT2 is more forgiving of recording quality, the DAVE makes no attempt to smooth out rough recordings. M-scaler? This refines the DAVE even further but I can see why some like the DAVE on its own, I think rhythm is better without the scaler but you also lose some coherency, a sense of musicians playing together. See if you can audition one at home.
Chord DAVE DAC
Any owners who want to tell me more about it? I recently received an inheritance worth about 13k. I can shell out another 2 grand to get my end-game DAC with headphones. Or...maybe the wife and kids want their bathrooms renovated
Please tell me how it sounds. I don't have a dealer close-by to audition. I just want "end-game" performance so I won't have to worry. I listen to mostly .flac and .wav files with some .mp3s (320 kbps) in the mix. Only because it was hard to get those albums so I downloaded mp3s and saved money.
- Jack