[musickid]

A conspiracy.

 

[Torq]

How do you know that's not the plan? I'm sure they're working on a DAVE 2.

I'm just going on posts made by Rob (I think they're in his blog thread, but they might be in the main DAVE one, I'm too lazy to go find them) about it being, likely, years before a DAVE 2 would be possible (cost effectively, at least).

Since you can buy an M-Scaler today, and a Hugo 2 TT in August, either DAVE 2 has to be shipping by then or if the M-Scaler + Hugo 2 TT beats it then DAVE sales will dry up instantly. This doesn't seem likely. I'll be very surprised if a DAVE 2 became available ahead of a standalone M-Scaler (something Rob has said is coming). Just guessing, but they're guesses drawn from comments from Rob and Chord.

 

[musickid]

No dave 2 till the next gen. of fpga's which fit more logic cells in the same space. Can someone explain the difference between pulse array dac/modulator and element bit confused here.

 

[D2Girls]

Why does it have a switching power supply?

 

[Mediahound]

Why does it have a switching power supply?

Likely because it's actually powered by the supercapacitors so the power supply just charges those.

 

[musickid]

Because a good switching ps gives better performance than a lps.

 

[elviscaprice]

Because a good switching ps gives better performance than a lps.

Are you serious???

 

[musickid]

Surely this explains all...

"Chord's famous switch-mode power supplies". From Moorgate acoustics web page. I am by no means an engineer but understand the difference between lps and smps. Chord have implemented smps due to lower impedence???

 

[Kakki]

It looks like it has 18w output for balanced. Can we do BTL for speakers using the balanced output?

 

[iDesign]

I'm just going on posts made by Rob (I think they're in his blog thread, but they might be in the main DAVE one, I'm too lazy to go find them) about it being, likely, years before a DAVE 2 would be possible (cost effectively, at least).

Since you can buy an M-Scaler today, and a Hugo 2 TT in August, either DAVE 2 has to be shipping by then or if the M-Scaler + Hugo 2 TT beats it then DAVE sales will dry up instantly. This doesn't seem likely. I'll be very surprised if a DAVE 2 became available ahead of a standalone M-Scaler (something Rob has said is coming). Just guessing, but they're guesses drawn from comments from Rob and Chord.

Although a DAVE 2 is sometime away, it would make a lot of sense for Chord to offer firmware updates for the DAVE so they could more easily add the new filters and evolve the product. Firmware updates would "prevent DAVE sales from drying up instantly" and have the effect of reducing the secondhand market, lengthening the product cycle, and increasing brand loyalty/retention. I'm sure a lot of DAVE owners would prefer to pay for firmware updates than have to shell out for a DAVE 2. Plus it would get a lot of potential buyers off the fence who are deciding if its too late to purchase a DAVE. And here is the math based on approximate release dates and the dates of press releases written by Dan George Communications for Chord:

DAC64 Announced: 1999
QBD76 Announced: 12/3/2009 Replaced previous version in approx: 3989 days
DAVE Announced: 5/14/2015 Replaced previous version in: 1988 days

HUGO Announced: 12/26/2013
HUGO 2 Announced: 1/5/2017 Replaced previous version in: 1106 days

HUGO TT Announced: 1/7/2015
HUGO TT2 Announced: 5/10/2018 Replaced previous version in: 1219 days

Qute Announced: 9/11/2012
2Qute Announced: 1/6/2015 Replaced previous version in: 847 days
Qutest Announced: 1/9/2018 Replaced previous version in: 1099 days

Chord's total average DAC replacement time is about 1250 days if we exclude the DAC64 as an outlier. The DAVE has been on sale 1092 days as of this post so it has some life ahead.

 

[514077]

Although a DAVE 2 is sometime away, it would make a lot of sense for Chord to offer firmware updates for the DAVE so they could more easily add the new filters and evolve the product. Firmware updates would "prevent DAVE sales from drying up instantly" and have the effect of reducing the secondhand market, lengthening the product cycle, and increasing brand loyalty. I'm sure a lot of DAVE owners would prefer to pay for firmware updates than have to shell out for a DAVE 2. Plus it would get a lot of potential buyers off the fence who are deciding if its too late to purchase a DAVE.

except that from the impressions I get from reading Rob's posts, that there's no (or not much) room left on the FPGAs with his code. And that an update might be too risky in damaging what's already there. Like other people on Chord product threads, I may be going too far in speculation up the a**. But, it seems Chord's DACs aren't updateable for a good reason.

 

[meomap]

Although a DAVE 2 is sometime away, it would make a lot of sense for Chord to offer firmware updates for the DAVE so they could more easily add the new filters and evolve the product. Firmware updates would "prevent DAVE sales from drying up instantly" and have the effect of reducing the secondhand market, lengthening the product cycle, and increasing brand loyalty/retention. I'm sure a lot of DAVE owners would prefer to pay for firmware updates than have to shell out for a DAVE 2. Plus it would get a lot of potential buyers off the fence who are deciding if its too late to purchase a DAVE. And here is the math based on approximate release dates and the dates of press releases written by Dan George Communications for Chord:

DAC64 Announced: 1999
QBD76 Announced: 12/3/2009 Replaced previous version in approx: 3989 days
DAVE Announced: 5/14/2015 Replaced previous version in: 1988 days

HUGO Announced: 12/26/2013
HUGO 2 Announced: 1/5/2017 Replaced previous version in: 1106 days

HUGO TT Announced: 1/7/2015
HUGO TT2 Announced: 5/10/2018 Replaced previous version in: 1219 days

Qute Announced: 9/11/2012
2Qute Announced: 1/6/2015 Replaced previous version in: 847 days
Qutest Announced: 1/9/2018 Replaced previous version in: 1099 days

Chord's total average DAC replacement time is about 1250 days if we exclude the DAC64 as an outlier. The DAVE has been on sale 1092 days as of this post.

Owners PAY for a fw upgrades?

 

[iDesign]

Owners PAY for a fw upgrades?

For example, PS Audio's Redcloud update. And its worth mentioning the success of Schiit's upgrade strategy with the Yggdrasil Analog 2 and USB Gen 5 hardware and firmware updates. The market has demonstrated it will pay for upgrades and owners want modular platforms-- to some degree the anticipation of a standalone M-Scaler further demonstrates this.

 

[Rob Watts]

Hi @Rob Watts

Do the TT2’s measurements come really close to Dave’s?

The power supply and analogue sections read like things have really been improved. Dave is 3 years old, so naturally there will be improvements of course.

There’s only the marketing material to go off but the power supply and analogue section improvements read very impressive indeed!

Can you share measurements when you get a chance and share which measurements specifically where Dave still rules supreme?

Just eye balling what’s been published so far and knowing you’ve probably learnt a lot even since Dave 3 years ago, I imagine it’s really really close to Dave in performance.

Cheers!

The TT2 measurements in pure DAC mode are pretty much the same as Hugo 2; and the fundamental limitations are the 10e elements on the pulse array, and a much more complex and sophisticated analogue section with Dave. So with Dave the DAC distortion is about 30 times lower...

But where TT2 really comes into it's own is raw power; you have the capability of 18W RMS using the balanced XLR, and 7W RMS single ended (SE). What's interesting about this is that when the power goes up, the measurements stay the same - no degradation as the load is increased. And you can drop the load impedance, and the linearity is unaffected, and this is absolutely crucial for driving tough loads. This project has proven very interesting, as there has been a lot of cross-fertilisation from the prototypes of the power pulse array project (which promises huge powers); indeed, the TT2 OP stage comes from the power pulse array design.

I am doing a public presentation on Saturday at Munich where I will be publishing the data. I will post the presentation here too, with some extra commentary.

1) In UK it is 4k for tt2 8.5k for dave. More than double.

2) Can someone explain how tt2 is powered/charged/operated. I don't see a on/off switch.

3) How will tt2 handle low impedence high sensitivity cans. in tt1 manual it states no problem here.

It has a standby switch which puts power to well below 2W; and the remote also controls standby.

The power supply actually is quite complex; on powering up, a specific fixed current is drawn from the PSU to charge the supercaps, and this takes typically 10 seconds to charge. Two sets of inductors are used to filter the input, plus copious RF filters; also the PSU is not any old unit - I needed a power supply that would meet international safety specs, and have no measured difference in performance (measured using the APX 2.5MHz ADC's) with the power connected or disconnected - and eventually after testing several, I found the unit supplied with TT 2.

TT2 has a low gain setting; this ensures that the OP noise voltage is only 1.6uV - that's the lowest residual noise of any DAC I have ever designed (against the high gain max OP voltage it's -135dB). I have to account for the AP's 1uV of residual noise to do this measurement!

How do you know that's not the plan? I'm sure they're working on a DAVE 2.

No I am not working or thinking about a Dave 2. In terms of raw transparency, detail resolution and depth perception, Dave is still easily the king...

 

[flyte3333]

a much more complex and sophisticated analogue section with Dave. So with Dave the DAC distortion is about 30 times lower...

Nice, cheers Rob. Always nice to hear it from the horse’s mouth!

I am doing a public presentation on Saturday at Munich where I will be publishing the data. I will post the presentation here too, with some extra commentary.

Awesome stuff. Thanks again