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Picked up a Chord Qutest Dac this weekend

nobeone said:
I too recently picked up a mojo, great multi use device for me: USB dac headphone amp for week day working from home on laptop; portable USB dac headphone amp for holidays away on phone/tablet; and slots into my main system with CCA on optical and on CDP on coax for evenings and weekends. I like it. Question is, how much better might qutest be in the main system?!!?
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I have had both DACs in my main system and I would describe the change between Mojo and Qutest as basically a decent step up in overall resolution of sound, dynamics are more coherent and powerful and bass more solid and with more weight. That was using the warm (red) filter to match the Mojo sound as much as possible as I believe the Mojo has a filter applied.

Mojo is an awesome DAC for the purchase price. Not sure I would say the step up in quality is equal to the cost of the Qutest imo.
 
MarkC274 said:
I have had both DACs in my main system and I would describe the change between Mojo and Qutest as basically a decent step up in overall resolution of sound, dynamics are more coherent and powerful and bass more solid and with more weight. That was using the warm (red) filter to match the Mojo sound as much as possible as I believe the Mojo has a filter applied.

Mojo is an awesome DAC for the purchase price. Not sure I would say the step up in quality is equal to the cost of the Qutest imo.
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Thanks Mark. I suppose, as always, deminishing returns, but it sounds like a "more of the same" from a Qutest, which is what I would look for in a future upgrade. Right now just enjoying the Mojo, but should I trip over the necessary at some point a Qutest would be on my list.
 
You might find that the dacs are essentially the same, the difference being better power supplies in the more expensive dac...

Hence trying an external PS (should generally have lower noise if it’s a good design) could bring the same or better benefits for a lot less cash....
 
Thetiminator said:
You might find that the dacs are essentially the same, the difference being better power supplies in the more expensive dac...

Hence trying an external PS (should generally have lower noise if it’s a good design) could bring the same or better benefits for a lot less cash....
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Well Mojo has an internal battery, Qutest does not. Both have one USB input for power (also charges the battery on Mojo) and a separate USB for USB source connection. Mojo user manual says "We recommend charging with Mojo switched off" so I always run it from the battery. Since the Qutest has no such battery, it is always run from the USB power. There may be difference between PSUs on the Qutest, and there may be a difference between running from battery in the Mojo and PSU on the Qutest, but you can't "upgrade" the Mojo with an external PSU if you only run it from batteries if you see what I mean.
 
I think Mojo taps are similar to the Qutest? From the making of Chord Mojo What HiFi interview "The chip is about four times as large as the chip inside Hugo. We had about 27,000 taps inside the Hugo, which is the maximum we could get into that chip. There wasn’t even space for housekeeping stuff like remembering settings! The problem with the new chip being larger and having four times the logic was that if we used all of it, it would’ve run too warm. So Rob decided to double the number of digital taps but run them at a lower rate, reducing power consumption." I read that as Mojo is about double 27,000, so roughly 52,000 taps, while the Qutest is stated on the Chord www site as 49,152 taps. My guess is then that they are both 49,152 taps ;)
 
Thanks for that. I presume the Mojo has been updated? Just galvanic isolation and power supply arrangements left then really. Because of these, general wisdom is to get the non portable versions of Chord dacs unless you need the portability and the head amp. So 2Qute instead of Hugo or Qutest instead of Hugo 2. This also saves money and allows you to experiment with LPSUs. You can even try audiophile cables since they will fit and not throw your Hugo at the wall.
 
Andrew L Weekes said:
I hadn't thought of it like that, but as someone who owned three WM-D6C's at one point you're right. I've got an Audioquest Dragonfly Red too, which I'd been using up until now, but it's not even close to the Mojo.
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Maybe that’s why the AW red is less than third if cost ofMojo?
 
Alex S said:
Thanks for that. I presume the Mojo has been updated? Just galvanic isolation and power supply arrangements left then really. Because of these, general wisdom is to get the non portable versions of Chord dacs unless you need the portability and the head amp. So 2Qute instead of Hugo or Qutest instead of Hugo 2. This also saves money and allows you to experiment with LPSUs. You can even try audiophile cables since they will fit and not throw your Hugo at the wall.
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Don't think there are or have been any updates for Mojo?

No need for power supply arrangements, it runs from battery, charge it with any cheapo thing you want, just run it from battery.

A cleaner USB source does seem to help the Mojo as AndyU posted previously HiFi news have measurements showing improvements when fed from a Melco N10.

I'm unlikely to spend big on audiophile cables anytime soon ...
 
Yes what I was thinking was maybe try the Qutest or 2Qute with a decent PS to see if they’re as good as the higher priced dacs...
Just from my experience the 2Qute with a PS was every bit as good as the QBD.
 
guest said:
Maybe that’s why the AW red is less than third if cost ofMojo?
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There's a lot of reasons in reality, different construction, no battery and charging circuit, no optical or SPDIF inputs, if only price had a direct correlation to sound quality, things would be much easier!
 
Andrew L Weekes said:
There's a lot of reasons in reality, different construction, no battery and charging circuit, no optical or SPDIF inputs, if only price had a direct correlation to sound quality, things would be much easier!
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Of course, goes without saying. But their purposes are the same.
 
MarkC274 said:
I have had both DACs in my main system and I would describe the change between Mojo and Qutest as basically a decent step up in overall resolution of sound, dynamics are more coherent and powerful and bass more solid and with more weight. That was using the warm (red) filter to match the Mojo sound as much as possible as I believe the Mojo has a filter applied.

Mojo is an awesome DAC for the purchase price. Not sure I would say the step up in quality is equal to the cost of the Qutest imo.
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Most welcome. Worth mentioning that I used an Ifi iPower 5v psu with both the Mojo and Qutest. Didn’t make any difference in sound with the Mojo other than to be strong enough to allow it to charge at the same time as playing music at line level. The Qutest however reacted well with a slightly cleaner sound and improved dynamics. Well worth investing as they are only approx £50 here in the UK.

https://ifi-audio.com/products/ipower/
 
MarkC274 said:
Most welcome. Worth mentioning that I used an Ifi iPower 5v psu with both the Mojo and Qutest. Didn’t make any difference in sound with the Mojo other than to be strong enough to allow it to charge at the same time as playing music at line level. The Qutest however reacted well with a slightly cleaner sound and improved dynamics. Well worth investing as they are only approx £50 here in the UK.

https://ifi-audio.com/products/ipower/
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The IFI power supplies fail early. Mine was broken after 2.5 years and since it did not make a difference to the Chord Mojo, I did not get a new one.
 
lagavullin10y said:
The IFI power supplies fail early. Mine was broken after 2.5 years and since it did not make a difference to the Chord Mojo, I did not get a new one.
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Fair enough. I did read somewhere else about reliability issues with iFi psu’s but personally haven’t owned one long enough or experienced a failure for it to be an issue.

Maybe the latest generation of iPowers are more robust???
 
MarkC274 said:
Fair enough. I did read somewhere else about reliability issues with iFi psu’s but personally haven’t owned one long enough or experienced a failure for it to be an issue.

Maybe the latest generation of iPowers are more robust???
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Well possible. Or maybe there was just a batch of 'weak' devices. It was good though on non Mojo devices.

By the way, the Chord Mojo is an every day joy for me. My employer has put me on work from home since this week and the Mojo follows me to the place where I'm working in my house (I need to find different spots all the time, since the kids seem to move from place to place too). A true Mobile Joy.

Now: CCAudio --> Mojo --> Nait 5 --> Naim IBLs.
 
Alex S said:
Thanks for that. I presume the Mojo has been updated? Just galvanic isolation and power supply arrangements left then really. Because of these, general wisdom is to get the non portable versions of Chord dacs unless you need the portability and the head amp. So 2Qute instead of Hugo or Qutest instead of Hugo 2. This also saves money and allows you to experiment with LPSUs. You can even try audiophile cables since they will fit and not throw your Hugo at the wall.
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You could always take mains power out of the equation fir the Qutest by simply using an external lithium power bank as did this chap:


Reduce mains cable and psu clutter too.
I don’t know fir how long the DAC would run on a typical powerbank, but they are cheap enough to be able to experiment, or have a hot swap pair.
 
I also tried battery supply with mine. I preferred the MCRU supply after a bit of back and forth. Battery was cleaner, sweeter and more analogue but softer dynamics and bass. Took the boogie out of the sound too...battery was better hifi but mains PS better music sums it up I suppose....
 
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