[emskymc]

Some guys do some measuerement of Anni. I reades about it, just donr remember where. From speakers output, seems Anni have equivalent of maximum 75W of power. Dont if this is true but could be your answer. Maybe. I dont know where that was and i dont know the methodology of the test. Sorry.

I believe that might be the Hi-Fi News review which found that "...the circuit is configured for 'real life/music-like' signals that are dynamic rather than unvarying. Under these conditions the Anni delivers a fine 13W, 20W, 35W and 60W into 8, 4, 2 and 1ohm loads. Hence the reason the Anni is consistently reported as sounding/performing rather beefier than that 10W specification might suggest..."

 

[Guy Fawkes]

I have a question for anyone using the Qutest+Anni stack:

I noticed that using a device that converts the Anni's DC output to USB for the Qutest, it is possible to power the Qutest with the Anni's power supply.

The question is: considering that Qutest does not have the on and off button while Anni does, by connecting Anni with Qutest via the DC/USB adapter, is it possible to control the turning ON and OFF of Qutest with the ON/OFF button of Anni?

Another question: I think I read that Anni's fan is constantly running even if Anni is turned off with the ON/OFF button, did I understand correctly? or does turning off the Anni also cause the fan to stop working?

 

[Alucard1]

The question is: considering that Qutest does not have the on and off button while Anni does, by connecting Anni with Qutest via the DC/USB adapter, is it possible to control the turning ON and OFF of Qutest with the ON/OFF button of Anni?

No, its not.

Another question: I think I read that Anni's fan is constantly running even if Anni is turned off with the ON/OFF button, did I understand correctly? or does turning off the Anni also cause the fan to stop working?

Anni and Qutest working the same way in matter of powering. Thay never really turn off, if you dont disconnect them completly from power source. Anni after being turned off, switching in the "stand-by" mode. Thats why you cant control Qutest even with Anni PSU. If they are connected to Anni PSU as a one, Qutest is also in stand by mode.

 

[Alucard1]

Well, Qutest in the end, no matter what you do, its alwyas ON. Only cutting the power turns him off.

 

[Guy Fawkes]

No, its not.

Anni and Qutest working the same way in matter of powering. Thay never really turn off, if you dont disconnect them completly from power source. Anni after being turned off, switching in the "stand-by" mode. Thats why you cant control Qutest even with Anni PSU. If they are connected to Anni PSU as a one, Qutest is also in stand by mode.

I understand, what about the fan instead? when you put Anni on standby, does the fan stop working?

 

[Alucard1]

I understand, what about the fan instead? when you put Anni on standby, does the fan stop working?

No, the fan just workin slower. Hi is always hearable.

 

[Guy Fawkes]

No, the fan just workin slower. Hi is always hearable.

I liked the idea of a Qutest + Anni stack, although I don't know how much better it would be than a Hugo2, but it doesn't really make any sense for the fan to continue running when turned off and that puts me off a bit

 

[Alucard1]

in terms of amplfier Anni is much better than Hugo2 output but in therms of DAC i prefer Hugo2 or Hugo TT2 signature. Its has more distance from listener, its more refined and relaxed, especially TT2. I was hearing TT2 like a 3 weeks ago and it has no need any external ampfier. Its a complete dac/headphone amp combo with very refined and relaxed sound signature from DAC and powerful analog output. If you have money, go for it. Qutest Anni stack for me has too intense and too close sounding profile, for me midrange is alwyas forward. But if you want DAVE for example and you dont have money for it, go for Qutest, its a like 80% of DAVE, without his dark timbre and fulness. A illite bit less refined and coherent too. But if you hear Qutest, you bascially know how DAVE sound - fast, intense and with huge in your face midrange. Hugo line sound more relaxed. But onboard headphone amplifier in DAVE its a state of the art amplfier in terms of sound, not pure power. In the end for me its:
1.DAVE
2.TT2 (propbaly even better with good PSU)
3.Qutest/Anni stack (especajlly with my new PSU)
4.Hugo2

 

[Alucard1]

If you fear noise of the fan, ithink is not that loud when Anni is in standby mode. First couple minutes is little bit loud but after that he went more silnet. Problem its not existing when you have different PSU witch power switch. Otherwise you can always just switch off whole system from your power supply board or conditioner.

 

[Guy Fawkes]

in terms of amplfier Anni is much better than Hugo2 output but in therms of DAC i prefer Hugo2 or Hugo TT2 signature. Its has more distance from listener, its more refined and relaxed, especially TT2. I was hearing TT2 like a 3 weeks ago and it has no need any external ampfier. Its a complete dac/headphone amp combo with very refined and relaxed sound signature from DAC and powerful analog output. If you have money, go for it. Qutest Anni stack for me has too intense and too close sounding profile, for me midrange is alwyas forward. But if you want DAVE for example and you dont have money for it, go for Qutest, its a like 80% of DAVE, without his dark timbre and fulness. A illite bit less refined and coherent too. But if you hear Qutest, you bascially know how DAVE sound - fast, intense and with huge in your face midrange. Hugo line sound more relaxed. But onboard headphone amplifier in DAVE its a state of the art amplfier in terms of sound, not pure power. In the end for me its:
1.DAVE
2.TT2 (propbaly even better with good PSU)
3.Qutest/Anni stack (especajlly with my new PSU)
4.Hugo2

If you will allow me, I would like to take advantage of your knowledge of Chord products as well as your kind availability a little more.

Specifically, I'd like to ask you what exactly you mean by 'too intense profile' and its opposite 'relaxed' and with which musical genre you have determined these conclusions.

I ask because my goal is to drive an easy LCD-X so I don't need a lot of power but the sound profile might determine my preference.

The LCD-X is a fairly relaxed sounding headphone but with a fairly pronounced upper treble peak which can sometimes be annoying with too bright sources.

The genre I mainly listen to is EDM (Synthwave, Darksynth, Dubstep, etc) and distorted guitars and I think the LCD-X does a great job with these genres.

I already have a Mojo2 that I use mainly on the move and I connect the LCD-X to it from time to time, but I feel that it sounds a bit underpowered, not in terms of power as it makes them sound very loud, but in terms of sound performance.

That's why I wanted to take a quantum leap to be able to properly drive the LCD-X with a sound profile suitable for my music genre.

I have read that Anni manages to push the bass of Qutest well, while Hugo2 is more detailed (bright) and weak in the low end.

Actually I love fine details, the darksynth genre offers me plenty of them and I love to listen to them, that's why I had considered the Hugo2, but bass is also very important for me and maybe the Anni might be more suitable for this.... maybe a Hugo2 + Anni stack might be better than a Qutest + Anni? but then I also think about the TT2 but you confirm that it is very relaxed and maybe not the right combination with my LCD-X and the genre I listen to.

sorry if I went on a bit too long

 

[Alucard1]

Well, saying Qutest its too intesne, i specifically mean pushed forward midrange, what bring overall close to the listener sound, with lot of details coming right into you. This DAC play that way, but is also very threedimensional with good layering and speed. Anni is kinda tube soundng amplfier, but is full traznsitor. Anni its a big sound with huge low end, its not a dry bass, its full, big and punchy. With Qutest creates a wall of sound. For me itd not relaxed because i feel i alwyas sitting in front of two huge speakers like 2 meters from them. TT2 is rlaxed in oposition to this sound, becauseit like sitting not that close, he gaves more space and you feel like speakers are in right distance from you, you can listen louder because TT2 also have more weight to the sound and seems not so bright and intense. Im listen EDM and synthwave too, i listen Zardonic, Pendulum and other bassy music. TT2 is good choice for that music but DAVE despite have genes of Qutest (Qutest have genes of DAVE i suspose), i would say its even better. He have very orginal balance between fulness, intensity, speed, timbre. Sound from DAVE amplifier is amazing, its like playing Witcher 3 on 4k monitor on Uber+ settings witch Multismaplig on and you still have maxmium smoothness of the picture. So you have all the deatils without losing anything from visibility and transparency of the graphics. Thats the vizualization of the sound of DAVE and Qutest have a lot from DAVE, but not that smoothnes, not that dark timbre and not that fulness. Not that overall intensity. Speed is there, resolution also, but not that hi end treatment. Qutest also need good PSU to shine but its overall weaker perfomer from DAVE and TT2. With good PSU, the qquality of Qutest/Anni stack its on the TT2 level, but its just sound different. Sound profile of TT2 make him just natural partner for most of the headphones. He was sounding perfect with HEDDphone Two for example. He plays with Audeze LCD2 very good. I prefer TT2 and DAVE over the Qutest/Anni stack, TT2 for overall performance, and DAVE for maximalize everything you can expect from hi end DAC/amp combo. Well, i did not know LCDX very good. I was listening them once in the store, like a 3 years ago and i dont remember them much. I suspose they can sound very good from Qutest/Anni and from TT2. Also with DAVE for shure. I think your choice gonna be dependent after all from few things, like how you like your music, more intense on your face, or you want smoething with more distance, with more weight. Between Qutest/Anni and TT2 as comibnation for headphone, the quality gap it very small if you use external line PSU. I have my stack powered by such thing and it does many good in the sound. If comes to the amplifier on boards Anni and TT2, both have power to drive these LCDX to full potencial. I think they gonna be sound very good with both TT2 and Qutest/Anni. YOu can choose TT2 if you need something uniwersal for many headphones with different profiles, and yif you want even sound with good weight and timbre. Or you can go with Qutest/Anni stack if you need that extra emotion and like that British midrange forward presentation of music with a lot of attacking details. Any of these gears should not sound bad with this kind of music. If they have good source material and theay are proper powered, i think the choice is money and taste dependant.

 

[Sandinears]

I have the Hugo 2 and the Lcd X. The pairing is amazing. No need for the anni. It sounds much better than the Lcdx - mojo 2 combination. Hugo2 amp has enough power for the LCDx . I actually tried the hugo2 and the Anni combo via rca,i felt the Hugo2 sounds better on its own. It loses a bit of the holographic soundstaging with the Anni.

 

[Alucard1]

This onboard amp in Hugo2 its not the power beast but sometimeshe can make a good job. He plays very good with D8000 for example.

 

[Guy Fawkes]

Well, saying Qutest its too intesne, i specifically mean pushed forward midrange, what bring overall close to the listener sound, with lot of details coming right into you. This DAC play that way, but is also very threedimensional with good layering and speed. Anni is kinda tube soundng amplfier, but is full traznsitor. Anni its a big sound with huge low end, its not a dry bass, its full, big and punchy. With Qutest creates a wall of sound. For me itd not relaxed because i feel i alwyas sitting in front of two huge speakers like 2 meters from them. TT2 is rlaxed in oposition to this sound, becauseit like sitting not that close, he gaves more space and you feel like speakers are in right distance from you, you can listen louder because TT2 also have more weight to the sound and seems not so bright and intense. Im listen EDM and synthwave too, i listen Zardonic, Pendulum and other bassy music. TT2 is good choice for that music but DAVE despite have genes of Qutest (Qutest have genes of DAVE i suspose), i would say its even better. He have very orginal balance between fulness, intensity, speed, timbre. Sound from DAVE amplifier is amazing, its like playing Witcher 3 on 4k monitor on Uber+ settings witch Multismaplig on and you still have maxmium smoothness of the picture. So you have all the deatils without losing anything from visibility and transparency of the graphics. Thats the vizualization of the sound of DAVE and Qutest have a lot from DAVE, but not that smoothnes, not that dark timbre and not that fulness. Not that overall intensity. Speed is there, resolution also, but not that hi end treatment. Qutest also need good PSU to shine but its overall weaker perfomer from DAVE and TT2. With good PSU, the qquality of Qutest/Anni stack its on the TT2 level, but its just sound different. Sound profile of TT2 make him just natural partner for most of the headphones. He was sounding perfect with HEDDphone Two for example. He plays with Audeze LCD2 very good. I prefer TT2 and DAVE over the Qutest/Anni stack, TT2 for overall performance, and DAVE for maximalize everything you can expect from hi end DAC/amp combo. Well, i did not know LCDX very good. I was listening them once in the store, like a 3 years ago and i dont remember them much. I suspose they can sound very good from Qutest/Anni and from TT2. Also with DAVE for shure. I think your choice gonna be dependent after all from few things, like how you like your music, more intense on your face, or you want smoething with more distance, with more weight. Between Qutest/Anni and TT2 as comibnation for headphone, the quality gap it very small if you use external line PSU. I have my stack powered by such thing and it does many good in the sound. If comes to the amplifier on boards Anni and TT2, both have power to drive these LCDX to full potencial. I think they gonna be sound very good with both TT2 and Qutest/Anni. YOu can choose TT2 if you need something uniwersal for many headphones with different profiles, and yif you want even sound with good weight and timbre. Or you can go with Qutest/Anni stack if you need that extra emotion and like that British midrange forward presentation of music with a lot of attacking details. Any of these gears should not sound bad with this kind of music. If they have good source material and theay are proper powered, i think the choice is money and taste dependant.

Thank you very much for taking the time to clarify my questions.
I think I'll skip the Hugo2 and Qutest+Anni and take the big step towards the TT2, however I'm still not 100% convinced as I think the TT2 might be oversized for the LCD-X and I might not hear much difference between the Hugo2 and the TT2.
This is why I posed the question on the TT2's thread.

I have the Hugo 2 and the Lcd X. The pairing is amazing. No need for the anni. It sounds much better than the Lcdx - mojo 2 combination. Hugo2 amp has enough power for the LCDx . I actually tried the hugo2 and the Anni combo via rca,i felt the Hugo2 sounds better on its own. It loses a bit of the holographic soundstaging with the Anni.

Were you able to do a comparison between the Hugo2 and the TT2 with your LCD-X?

 

[Alucard1]

I think you hear the diffrence between them. I remember Hugo2 sound thinner and more shouty than amplifier in TT2. TT2 is good for almost any headphones as a combo, Hugo 2 mainly as a dac. Sometimes he just catch good synergy. Espacialy with thick sounding headphones.