Chord Qutest

[OldBigEars]

14 hours ago, barrows said:

 I am quite confident that the Qutest will easily outperform the usual suspects in the $2K-$5K range. 

 

As far as "factual" support, well, there is no such thing as a "fact" when it comes to which sounds better, 

 

@Barrows I get where you're coming from....and completely  agree that musical performance cannot be evaluated by metrics alone.  Which somewhat reduces your first statement above to an "interesting personal opinion".   No doubt, your view is somewhat validated by enormous industry and electrical engineering experience.  But your findings are far from universal and based on triangulation assumptions, that's all.

[barrows]

Perhaps, in my experience, the Qutest would have to be an outlier to not be really good, considering what I have heard from the Mojo and DAVE.  And the reports of others do not suggest the Qutest is an outlier or failure on Chord's part.

A large number of reviews have already appeared, and the overwhelming consensus is of excellent, even standard setting, sonics.  While all reviews need to be taken with a grain of salt, when there are a large number of very positive reviews, I take notice.

[jamesg11]

Reservation for me - with a large dsd library - re jumping for Qutest, has been Miska’s question mark:

“I'm not sure how Qutest handles DSD input, but if it is like Mojo (which leaks lot of DSD noise aliased down), then it is better to send it 705.6/768k PCM instead. HQPlayer can give you good DSD-to-PCM conversion”.

 

Resolved only by extended home listening ie purchase, or Miska himself buying, listening, testing!

But this quandary is of course a common enough decision-time experience ...

[barrows]

7 minutes ago, jamesg11 said:

Reservation for me - with a large dsd library - re jumping for Qutest, has been Miska’s question mark:

“I'm not sure how Qutest handles DSD input, but if it is like Mojo (which leaks lot of DSD noise aliased down), then it is better to send it 705.6/768k PCM instead. HQPlayer can give you good DSD-to-PCM conversion”.

 

Resolved only by extended home listening ie purchase, or Miska himself buying, listening, testing!

But this quandary is of course a common enough decision-time experience ...

Yeah, I understand this.  Chord DACs certainly reflect Rob Watts' preference for PCM over DSD.  As far as I know only the DAVE has the separate processing algorithm for DSD, and all other Chord DACs do a DSD-PCM conversion (with decimation) before conversion.

I am agreed that someone who has a real preference for DSD might choose a different DAC (T+A, and Holo Audio come immediately to mind here with their discrete DSD conversion).  I personally love DSD, and am converting all my files to DSD 256 during playback (either by my ESS 9038 or DSC-2 (experiemental) based DIY DACs) on the fly using ROON (for now).  With my Mojo (used as a portable via my iPad) I just send all files at their native rates and let the Mojo do its thing, and the vast majority of my library is PCM, so I do not worry about it that much.  Of course I am always buying more DSD music, but it will always be a small portion of my entire library, and I suspect he same is true for most listeners.

 

My point is, at the price of the Qutest, I just think it is a no brainer purchase for most.  Perhaps excluding those few who might be interested in DSD oversampling in software and a Holo Audio Cyan or Spring...  I just figure that the average audiophile is not doing DSD oversampling in software and has a library primarily made up of PCM files.

[ecwl]

1 hour ago, jamesg11 said:

Reservation for me - with a large dsd library - re jumping for Qutest, has been Miska’s question mark:

“I'm not sure how Qutest handles DSD input, but if it is like Mojo (which leaks lot of DSD noise aliased down), then it is better to send it 705.6/768k PCM instead. HQPlayer can give you good DSD-to-PCM conversion”.

 

Resolved only by extended home listening ie purchase, or Miska himself buying, listening, testing!

But this quandary is of course a common enough decision-time experience ...

I think Rob Watts has been quite clear that for Qutest, he decimates DSD to 705.6kHz with a stop band attenuation of 220dB (although not sure at what frequency but I presume around 22kHz) with Qutest. This is definitely different than Mojo.

Whether HQPlayer can give you "better" DSD-to-PCM conversion, I don't know as I don't even know what "better" means. In my mind, it means you like the sound more so it's subjective (or it's more technically accurate to the original analog waveform which is a can of worms on its own because it depends on what parameters you define as "accurate").

But I think it's not a quandry at all. Listen to Chord Qutest in your system using bit-perfect files sent to the Qutest (be they DSD or PCM) and then see if you like the sound. If you do, you can keep on buying your DSDs and listening to them through Qutest. If you don't, there are other DACs.

[George Hincapie]

I'd like to compare the Qutest or the Hugo TT 2 against my Metrum Acoustics Onyx to see what the fuss is all about.

[OldBigEars]

3 hours ago, barrows said:

 

My point is, at the price of the Qutest, I just think it is a no brainer purchase for most.  Perhaps excluding those few who might be interested in DSD oversampling in software and a Holo Audio Cyan or Spring...  I just figure that the average audiophile is not doing DSD oversampling in software and has a library primarily made up of PCM files.

 

You clearly like it much better than, say....Schiit Yiggy, Metrum Onyx, Mytek Brooklyn DAC+, Border Patrol, Denafrips...to name just a few favorites out there.  To the extent it's a no-brainer.  Wow, that's a strong recommendation, for sure.

[photonblur]

Being perceptive, I get barrows likes this dac.  There

are dac's in a given system that will out perform, as

in objectively sound better, but there are $2,000-

$5,000 dacs that would be embarassed by that

cutesy Qutest.  It's even small.

 

Approaching the final keep or return date on my

30 day $ back trial has a way of focusing my audio

evaluation facilities.  The usb regen is out of the

picture.  Qutest is naked. No pumped psu.  No ultra

this or that, just streaming from the squeezebox

touch/LMS tidal app.  Two days ago I installed drapes

over the glass side of the living/listening room;

combined with dac burn in I'm getting a smooth dynamic

sound that never happened with old Yggy.  Kinda liquid

like a piano with a sustain pedal effect.  So much for

vague objectivist meanderings, bottom line, despite

the stock mrkt. this is sounding like a keeper.

 

pb-

 

 

[pl_svn]

7 hours ago, George Hincapie said:

I'd like to compare the Qutest or the Hugo TT 2 against my Metrum Acoustics Onyx to see what the fuss is all about.

 

a couple years ago I bought a 2Qute and with "some" disappointment found it to come very, very close to my beloved Metrum Hex ?

have a Qutest now and it is an improvement over the 2Qute. not letting the Hex go, even though Chord's have been my main DACs since 

[Miska]

11 hours ago, ecwl said:

I think Rob Watts has been quite clear that for Qutest, he decimates DSD to 705.6kHz with a stop band attenuation of 220dB (although not sure at what frequency but I presume around 22kHz) with Qutest. This is definitely different than Mojo.

Whether HQPlayer can give you "better" DSD-to-PCM conversion, I don't know as I don't even know what "better" means. In my mind, it means you like the sound more so it's subjective (or it's more technically accurate to the original analog waveform which is a can of worms on its own because it depends on what parameters you define as "accurate").

But I think it's not a quandry at all. Listen to Chord Qutest in your system using bit-perfect files sent to the Qutest (be they DSD or PCM) and then see if you like the sound. If you do, you can keep on buying your DSDs and listening to them through Qutest. If you don't, there are other DACs.

 

I just think it is kind of pointless to decimate DSD down to some low rate PCM in an SDM DAC (like Chord) and then convert it back up again. That is exactly what is wrong with all the current PCM material, because it all came to be in an SDM ADC, then squeezed down to low rate PCM just to be converted back up again. It certainly won't improve anything. So for DSD I'd go with a DAC that can directly convert DSD to analog. And maybe oversample DSD to higher DSD rate in software before that (just an optional option, not by any means mandatory).

 

[Spongebob]

Has any one heard both the Qutest and the Holo Audio Cyan ?

[HumanMedia]

On 10/30/2018 at 7:50 PM, Miska said:

 

I just think it is kind of pointless to decimate DSD down to some low rate PCM in an SDM DAC (like Chord) and then convert it back up again. That is exactly what is wrong with all the current PCM material, because it all came to be in an SDM ADC, then squeezed down to low rate PCM just to be converted back up again. It certainly won't improve anything. So for DSD I'd go with a DAC that can directly convert DSD to analog. And maybe oversample DSD to higher DSD rate in software before that (just an optional option, not by any means mandatory).

 

 

So to make the best of a bad situation for the Qutest using HQPlayer, would your recommended strategy be to upsample all PCM to 768k and downsample all DSD to 768PCM?

 

Does HQPlayer allow for an optimal PCM upsampling setting alongside an optimal DSD downsampling setting? What settings for both would you recommend?

 

I am under the impression that the usual strategy for HQPlayer is to upsample everything to the highest DSD the DAC can handle, but with the Qutest the strategy is probably different?

[ecwl]

40 minutes ago, HumanMedia said:

I am under the impression that the usual strategy for HQPlayer is to upsample everything to the highest DSD the DAC can handle, but with the Qutest the strategy is probably different?

I think asking Miska the best way to play music from HQPlayer to Qutest is a great idea. I suspect he would recommend upsampling/converting everything to PCM768.

 

But similarly, if you were to ask Rob Watts, the designer of Qutest, he would say just play everything bit-perfect into Qutest and skip HQPlayer. Play DSD bitperfect into Qutest and play PCM files bit-perfect with no upsampling into Qutest and let Qutest do all the work. That's what you paid the FPGA in the Qutest for.

 

I think every designer has their preferences and like to incorporate them into their designs. Ultimately, if you own both Qutest and HQPlayer, you can pick and choose what you like best.

 

As a point of reference though, if you go to the Chord DAVE thread on Head-Fi, I'd say of the people who have tried Chord DAVE and HQPlayer, I would estimate 9 out of 10 prefers bit-perfect (including DSD) into DAVE while the remaining 1out of 10 prefers running HQPlayer upsampling to PCM/DSD first. Ultimately, it's about what you want to get out of your musical experience so whatever you like best is the way to go.

[Miska]

53 minutes ago, HumanMedia said:

So to make the best of a bad situation for the Qutest using HQPlayer, would your recommended strategy be to upsample all PCM to 768k and downsample all DSD to 768PCM?

 

Yes, that's my recommendation...

 

53 minutes ago, HumanMedia said:

Does HQPlayer allow for an optimal PCM upsampling setting alongside an optimal DSD downsampling setting? What settings for both would you recommend?

 

As usual, leave HQPlayer volume set to -3 dBFS to avoid triggering limiter on inter-sample overs. Since the DAC should accept 32-bit PCM input, you can use just TPDF dither. And upsampling filter choice is more subjective, there are some descriptions in the manual. Depending on what kind of sonic properties you are most sensitive to. If you like sonics similar to Chord itself, try some of the long filters, like poly-sinc-xtr, closed-form/closed-form-M, poly-sinc-ext2 or sinc-M. Or alternatively try something like what I'm using like poly-sinc-short/poly-sinc-short-mp which are closer to other end of the spectrum.

 

For DSD to PCM conversion settings you are quite good with the defaults. You can usually safely enable 6 dB gain, especially since the volume should be anyway set to -3 dBFS, resulting in effective gain of 3 dB. You can also try "low" setting for the DSD noise filter to cut more of the noise out - this gives almost flat noise floor on most DSD material.

 

[Miska]

20 minutes ago, ecwl said:

That's what you paid the FPGA in the Qutest for.

 

I hope not just <$100 FPGA chip... I would still say that there are still many aspects in buying a DAC. Do you buy it for the DSP features, do you buy it for the actual D/A conversion, or the combination? Some DACs sport more DSP and some less. Even if DAC doesn't have great amount of processing power for DSP, it may still perform well the primary job which is in my opinion converting digital to analog. Sometimes these two functions are easier to split and sometimes harder (Chord).

 

For example with my RME ADI-2's, I don't use any of the DSP functionalities that it has in the FPGA and DAC chip. I have it set to DSD Direct mode and the DAC is just passing data straight through, bit-perfect from input to the analog conversion without any DSP. And it performs extremely well in this function. And I don't feel that I wouldn't be using exactly what I paid for. Unfortunately you cannot do the same with Chord (although they could fairly easily implement it if they wanted to)...

 

As I've said before, I think DAC should pass input data to analog conversion bit-perfect...

[barrows]

32 minutes ago, ecwl said:

But similarly, if you were to ask Rob Watts, the designer of Qutest, he would say just play everything bit-perfect into Qutest and skip HQPlayer. Play DSD bitperfect into Qutest and play PCM files bit-perfect with no upsampling into Qutest and let Qutest do all the work. That's what you paid the FPGA in the Qutest for.

Yeah, I have to agree with the above.  If one purchases a Chord DAC, one is buying into Rob Watts' philosophy on oversampling/filtering, and one should at least listen to it just sending files at their native rates, and then compare with HQPlayer oversampling to 752.8/768.

[barrows]

@Miska, do the RME ADI-2s use AKM DAC chip(s) with their native DSD conversion capability? 

[Miska]

9 minutes ago, barrows said:

@Miska, do the RME ADI-2s use AKM DAC chip(s) with their native DSD conversion capability? 

 

You have option to do so. They expose pretty much all the AKM chip functionality through the front panel menu. Plus they have quite a bunch of DSP features on the FPGA too, but only for PCM. Although they have basic level monitor and spectrum analyzer for DSD content too. (They also implement the UAC2 stuff on FPGA, unlike Chord.)

 

It has two DAC chips. One is for the rear analog outs plus headphone connector 1/2 on front panel. This chip can be switched to DSD Direct mode. When DSD Direct is on, 1/2 headphone connector is muted due to lack of volume control. The other chip serves only headphone connector 3/4 on front panel and this cannot be switched to DSD Direct mode and is thus always active because it also has volume control.

 

 

TEAC DACs (at least UD-503/NT-503) also run in DSD Direct mode, but IIRC don't even have option to turn it off.

 

[barrows]

2 minutes ago, Miska said:

 

You have option to do so. They expose pretty much all the AKM chip functionality through the front panel menu. Plus they have quite a bunch of DSP features on the FPGA too, but only for PCM. Although they have basic level monitor and spectrum analyzer for DSD content too. (They also implement the UAC2 stuff on FPGA, unlike Chord.)

 

 

TEAC DACs (at least UD-503/NT-503) also run in DSD Direct mode, but IIRC don't even have option to turn it off.

 

Thanks, good to know.

[jamesg11]

On 11/9/2018 at 10:58 AM, Miska said:

 

You have option to do so. They expose pretty much all the AKM chip functionality through the front panel menu. Plus they have quite a bunch of DSP features on the FPGA too, but only for PCM. Although they have basic level monitor and spectrum analyzer for DSD content too. (They also implement the UAC2 stuff on FPGA, unlike Chord.)

 

It has two DAC chips. One is for the rear analog outs plus headphone connector 1/2 on front panel. This chip can be switched to DSD Direct mode. When DSD Direct is on, 1/2 headphone connector is muted due to lack of volume control. The other chip serves only headphone connector 3/4 on front panel and this cannot be switched to DSD Direct mode and is thus always active because it also has volume control.

 

 

TEAC DACs (at least UD-503/NT-503) also run in DSD Direct mode, but IIRC don't even have option to turn it off.

 

@Miska - in your view, a definite step up then on the iFi idsd for dsd playback?

[HumanMedia]

On 11/9/2018 at 10:11 AM, ecwl said:

But similarly, if you were to ask Rob Watts, the designer of Qutest, he would say just play everything bit-perfect into Qutest and skip HQPlayer. Play DSD bitperfect into Qutest and play PCM files bit-perfect with no upsampling into Qutest and let Qutest do all the work. That's what you paid the FPGA in the Qutest for.

 

I think every designer has their preferences and like to incorporate them into their designs. Ultimately, if you own both Qutest and HQPlayer, you can pick and choose what you like best.

 

As a point of reference though, if you go to the Chord DAVE thread on Head-Fi, I'd say of the people who have tried Chord DAVE and HQPlayer, I would estimate 9 out of 10 prefers bit-perfect (including DSD) into DAVE while the remaining 1out of 10 prefers running HQPlayer upsampling to PCM/DSD first. Ultimately, it's about what you want to get out of your musical experience so whatever you like best i

 

Would love the Dave. The Qutest doesn’t deal with DSD as nicely as the Dave.which is why I was looking at downsamling it to PCM as the result should  be better. And maybe Rob isnt so down on a processor intensive upsamplung prior to the DAC as he has released his own product to do this in the Chord mscaler.

 

I’m sure it great, but It is pricey. Maybe HQPlayet is cheaper (different) but still worthwile  alternative?

 

[nick77]

Can someone please send me a screenshot of your HQP settings, I haven't been able to get it working with the Qutest. Are there any downloadable drivers? 

 

Thanks........

[paulmckwan]

On 10/30/2018 at 4:50 PM, Miska said:

 

I just think it is kind of pointless to decimate DSD down to some low rate PCM in an SDM DAC (like Chord) and then convert it back up again. That is exactly what is wrong with all the current PCM material, because it all came to be in an SDM ADC, then squeezed down to low rate PCM just to be converted back up again. It certainly won't improve anything. So for DSD I'd go with a DAC that can directly convert DSD to analog. And maybe oversample DSD to higher DSD rate in software before that (just an optional option, not by any means mandatory).

 

 

Just to share I've enjoy the SQ of "DSD to PCM downsampling" of dCS NB, and then i find upsample DSD64 to DSD128 before sending to NB, the resultant downsampled PCM has even better SQ. Less burr, and best of both world.

 

So I wonder if we upsample DSD to higher such as DSD512 (which is the max support by Qutest), the decimate inside Qutest will give a better SQ as I experience above.

[Ralf11]

On 10/27/2018 at 3:35 PM, barrows said:

I have a Chord Mojo, which in its portable usage (as i use it with my iPad and Audeze EL-8 'phones) sounds fantastic.  The Mojo handily beats out a lot of the $2K to $4K DACs I have heard, via headphones (I do not particularly think the Mojo is really suitable for a home system DAC, at least not in comparison to my other options).  Considering the Qutest uses newer algorithms, and many times more filter taps, and the sound quality reports from actual users, I am quite confident that the Qutest will easily outperform the usual suspects in the $2K-$5K range.  I have heard the DAVE, and it is a superb sounding component.

As far as "factual" support, well, there is no such thing as a "fact" when it comes to which sounds better, but the I am sure the measurements of the Qutest will please those looking for objective evidence of superior performance, as every Chord product produces superb measured results.

 

Interested to hear what you consider more suitable home DACs or just other options in that $2k price range.

 

or below if you've auditioned the RME ADI-2

 

pm if you want to void putting it on the thread

[barrows]

I recommended the Qutest to my brother for a home DAC, specifically because he uses a Sim Audio integrated amp (so he needs not a volume control) which is single ended, and it appeared to be the best performing DAC near its price.  The Mojo I love for portable use, but I have no use for something which runs via a limited battery supply for home use, I far prefer something I do not have to worry about charging.

My top recommendation for a home DAC ~2K is for the Qutest; to me it appears to offer more in terms of quality sound than its competitors.  I have not heard the RME you mention, I did have an RME pro DAC/ADC for awhile which I used for various things in a work environment, but I did not like its sound for pleasure listening.  If someone was more inclined to balanced operation and DSD, then I might recommend Holo Audio, although I really try not to, as I really prefer people choose other than Chinese product.

Qutest measurements are up over at stereophile.com, fairly impressive performance there on measures.