NDX and Chord Hugo
Posted by: Foxman50 on 18 April 2014
I have been contemplating adding a DAC to my NDX/XPS2 to see (or should that be hear) what it can bring to the party. And so thought it about time i made inroads into Having a few home demos. After looking around at products that are within my budget i came across the Chord Hugo DAC.
Although it is meant to be a portable headphone unit, it can be used as a full line level fixed DAC.
The dealer lent me a TQ black digital coax lead, which have twist grip plugs. This was required as the present batch of Hugo's have a case design fault that wont allow any decent cable to fit, soon to be rectified. Thankfully the TQ just manages to hang on to the coax port.
Once all connected and gone through the minimal setup procedure of the Hugo, what does the red LED mean again, i left it to warm up for half an hour.
Poured a beer and sat down for an evenings listening.
What was that, where did that come from, that's what that instrument is. OMG, as my little'n would say, Where is it getting all this detail from.
After spending last night and today with it, all i can say is that it has totally transformed my system from top to bottom. I never considered my NDX to be veiled or shut in, not even sure that's the correct terms. All i can say is its opened up the sound stage and space around instruments. Everything I've put through it has had my toes, feet and legs tapping away to the music.
Even putting the toe tapping, the resolution the clarity to one side, what its greatest achievement for me has been in making albums that I've had trouble listening too enjoyable now.
One added bonus is that it has made the XPS redundant. I cannot hear any difference with it in or out of the system.
While i thought a DAC may make a change in the degree of the jump from ND5 to NDX, i was not prepared for this. Anyone looking at adding a PSU to there NDX may want to check this unit out first.
For me this has to be the bargain of the year.
According to the review in hifi world this month, he suggests setting the volume on the Hugo to almost full throttle (White light). This gives the greatest dynamic range and best sound quality Apparently.
To be honest ive not tried it set at that level.
Graeme
Never trust hifi reviewers.
What I would like to know is if Hugo can drive a Nap directly. If there is no loss of information with this type of digital volume control there would be no need for a preamplifier save for analog sources. Has someone tried it already?
Hugo owners might be interested in reading the thoughts of a US Chord dealer called Aum Acoustics. Google "aum chord hugo modifications" and select the first match to do so.
This dealer describes the sound of the Hugo as excellent, but somewhat "thin" and "lacking body". He offers an Audiophilleo USB-to-S/PDIF converter and custom PS as a solution.
No clue if others hear this as well, or if this is simply a sales pitch, but I thought it was interesting reading and worth sharing.
ATB.
Hook
Hugo owners might be interested in reading the thoughts of a US Chord dealer called Aum Acoustics. Google "aum chord hugo modifications" and select the first match to do so.
This dealer describes the sound of the Hugo as excellent, but somewhat "thin" and "lacking body". He offers an Audiophilleo USB-to-S/PDIF converter and custom PS as a solution.
No clue if others hear this as well, or if this is simply a sales pitch, but I thought it was interesting reading and worth sharing.
ATB.
Hook
If you're believer, go for it...
I can make my judgment without too much influence from places like this, sorry.
Marketing is science, isn't it...
Hugo is too good to be qualified as "thin"...my 2 cents!
Have a look at the beginning of this thread. The Aum site has been discussed. While there is some interesting material there (see, for example, the Powerpoint presentation by Rob Watts), much of the site is an extended sales pitch for the site owner's power supply for the Hugo.
I noted some thinness during the first two weeks with the Hugo, but none after four weeks.
If you Type "Chord Hugo Head Fi" into your search engine, you should end up at the Head Fi forum's marathon Hugo thread. Rob Watts contributes now and then and his thoughts are well worth mining the thread for.
Never trust hifi reviewers.
To be fair he does state you need to be careful as it can start clipping especially with compressed audio
Graeme
Hi Hook, I must admit I am finding the Hugo far from sounding thin, in fact it was initially the other way, but perhaps that was because I hadn't connected the Hiline correctly or had let it 'warm up' for 24 hours (not that it gets warm at all) It does now sound well balanced to me, albeit I have pulled my speakers forward slightly ( ie it's more rich in the mids than I am used to but am enjoying). But the bass is gorgeous, and I was listening to my old favourite, Pink Floyd's The Wall and the musical energy and power emanating my speakers was fantastic... And all Red Book.
Also bizarrely, once fully charged, I have yet to hear a noticeable change from running on batteries or using the tiny supplied SMPS... That was surprising.
i will do a write up later... I am going through my NDS/NDAC evaluation tracks.. And the Hugo at the moment seems to be bridging the gap between the performance of those two DACs.
BTW I know it's sacrilege, but my Sky STB optical feed sounds very impressive.. not sure I have heard Sky sound so good.. And I used to work for them :-)
Simon
Have a look at the beginning of this thread. The Aum site has been discussed. While there is some interesting material there (see, for example, the Powerpoint presentation by Rob Watts), much of the site is an extended sales pitch for the site owner's power supply for the Hugo.
I noted some thinness during the first two weeks with the Hugo, but none after four weeks.
If you Type "Chord Hugo Head Fi" into your search engine, you should end up at the Head Fi forum's marathon Hugo thread. Rob Watts contributes now and then and his thoughts are well worth mining the thread for.
Thanks Jan-Erik - missed your earlier mention, and appreciate your pointer to the Head-Fi thread!
Were my interest in Hugo to develop, it would be as an upgrade to a Centrance Dacport that I've used for a few years for traveling. Bluetooth aptX from an iPad 4 may be good enough, but am curious if anyone has tested it with the lightening version of Apple's camera connection kit?
ATB.
Hook
A summary of the Hugo DAC connected to the NDX SPDIF digital source being streamed with 44.1/16 WAV media. This is turn is connected to a NAC282/NAP250.2 with HiCapDR and ATC SCM19 speakers. The interconnect is a DIN to phono Hiline cable.
The comparison has been made with a NDAC/555PS and NDS/555PS.
After having left the Hugo powered up for around 24 hours and fully chanrged the sound opened out and I started to seriously listen. I have a rather eclectic taste in music and so what follows is list of some of my tracks/albums that I am very familiar with.
30s/40s Boogie Woogie
- Tiny Bradshaw; Shout, Sister, Shout. A 1934 recording – so not hifi – but the Hugo finds great pace and rhythm – and no hint of stridency.
- Will Bradley & His Orchestra; Scrub Me, Mama, With a Boogie Beat. A 1940’s recording but has a sweet Big Band texture with a really satisfying and realistic drum set and percussion. The timing and the textures of his voice are impressive. There is no thinness and plenty of detail and organicness for a 1940’s recoding.
- Louis Jordan; Choo Choo Ch’Boogie; Again authentic sweet brass with lots of harmonics and textures, a lovely textured Jordan voice and a double bass strutting its stuff convincingly and enjoyably well. Great timing and pace.
50s/60s Jazz
- Atlantic Jazz Vocals Volume 1: A track sung by George Weir has an immediate and yet mellow response. The close mic technique working really well. Again the voice has loads of texture and overtones.
- Sylvia Syms; a lovely female jazz voice, mellow and emotional. The Hugo really digs out the emotion. The harmonic and textures from the Hugo playing woodwind/Trumpet and Piano all sound accurate and emotional. No dryness or dullness – just lots of textures.
- The jazz drums sounds lifelike and dynamic with a great dynamic response that really shifts the air in the room to give that jazz club feel. Impressive for 50s/60s recording.
David Flood’s Canterbury Cathedral Choir – singing Benjamin’s Ceremony of Carol
- Now this is an area that NDS did well and less so the NDAC. The Hugo in my opinion beats both. The Canterbury Cathedral reverb is magnificent yet subtle and the Harp accompanying the choristers provides initiates a great multitonal reverb with a lovely range of textures and subtle dynamics. The lead soprano chorister is Joel Whitewood and his voice, although soprano, sounds full and textured with lovely intonation. The final track, Recession, is outstanding and nerve tingling. Wow. I have never hear my ATCs sound like that.
Other female singers.
- By now I started to get a feel that voices sound rather special on this DAC. So I listened to Francois Hardy – she sounded wonderfully Gallic and sensual with the Hugo holding nothing back – definitely need a cold shower after that…
- Then one of my all time favourites, Sandy Denny, and a gig recording of her singing The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. The technical quality of the recording is not outstanding – but the detail, the sound of her moving around the microphone provides and her wonderful phrasing and close mic technique provides a delightful and insightful recording – again nerve tingling.
Jazz Clarinet
- I find clarinet a great test. When you a clarinet acoustically live there are lots of textures and tomes that really enhance the sound. Often this appears lost on replay. I played Evan Christopher, Django a la Creole - Finesse. It was gorgeous, the mids through to treble worked naturally and dynamically as a whole on the clarinet. All those complex textures and tones just seemed to appear in the room. It sounded authentic. No brightness or dullness. – and on Tropical Moon there is a wonderful interplay between a guitar and clarinet where the texture differences really seem to add to the musical performance.
Rock & Pop
- Charlie Blackwell – The Girl of My Beest Friend. Now this sounds fab on the NDAC. The Hugo does well, the bass bounces – perhaps not quite as rhythmically driven as the NDAC but sounds more natural.
- Specials – Ghost Town. Sounds awesome with great weight and vocals – with the Hammond like accompaniment and drums really providing a great sound. It all sounds as it should with an infectious timing and pace that you just cant sit still to. I even heard new notes played by the guitar in the chorus.
- Deadmau5 – Sofi Needs a Ladder. A great juvenile track that needs to be played loud. It has ultra low and loud bass line with deep club type drum line with lots of rich harmonics. Your speaker cones will have a workout when you play this. Timing needs to be spot on – as there is some interesting timing interplay. The Hugo dishes it up perfectly – and I hear some new production/mixing techniques that I never noticed before – awesome.
So I could go on – I listened to the Wall, The Black Dyke Brass Band, Johnny Cash at San Quentin, The Clash, Buzzcocks, Jean Michel Jarre, Chopin, Edith Piaf – and time after time the Hugo dished up detail and musicality – with no hardness – and a wonderfully natural tonal balance that makes piano, violin, brass band, wood wind, voices sound natural and real and vibrant with seemingly great timing.
So is there anything I don’t like? Well its small and a little fiddly – it has limited SPDIF inputs – and perhaps the very deep bass is a little softer than the NDAC/555PS I have been used to… but other than that I can’t fault it. It makes my regular Red Book music sound so real and wonderfully enjoyable – and my Naim NAC/NAP has never sounded so good.
I shall be ordering one.
Simon
Great stuff Simon, and nice reviewing style ! And to think, all of this with *only* 44/16 files...
Jan
PS. Don't forget to drop a little thank-you note to Rob Watts. The digital filter you're hearing (or rather not hearing) is the results of 20 years of his work and unwavering belief in how digital filtering should be done.
A summary of the Hugo DAC connected to the NDX SPDIF digital source being streamed with 44.1/16 WAV media. This is turn is connected to a NAC282/NAP250.2 with HiCapDR and ATC SCM19 speakers. The interconnect is a DIN to phono Hiline cable.
The comparison has been made with a NDAC/555PS and NDS/555PS.
After having left the Hugo powered up for around 24 hours and fully chanrged the sound opened out and I started to seriously listen. I have a rather eclectic taste in music and so what follows is list of some of my tracks/albums that I am very familiar with.
30s/40s Boogie Woogie
- Tiny Bradshaw; Shout, Sister, Shout. A 1934 recording – so not hifi – but the Hugo finds great pace and rhythm – and no hint of stridency.
- Will Bradley & His Orchestra; Scrub Me, Mama, With a Boogie Beat. A 1940’s recording but has a sweet Big Band texture with a really satisfying and realistic drum set and percussion. The timing and the textures of his voice are impressive. There is no thinness and plenty of detail and organicness for a 1940’s recoding.
- Louis Jordan; Choo Choo Ch’Boogie; Again authentic sweet brass with lots of harmonics and textures, a lovely textured Jordan voice and a double bass strutting its stuff convincingly and enjoyably well. Great timing and pace.
50s/60s Jazz
- Atlantic Jazz Vocals Volume 1: A track sung by George Weir has an immediate and yet mellow response. The close mic technique working really well. Again the voice has loads of texture and overtones.
- Sylvia Syms; a lovely female jazz voice, mellow and emotional. The Hugo really digs out the emotion. The harmonic and textures from the Hugo playing woodwind/Trumpet and Piano all sound accurate and emotional. No dryness or dullness – just lots of textures.
- The jazz drums sounds lifelike and dynamic with a great dynamic response that really shifts the air in the room to give that jazz club feel. Impressive for 50s/60s recording.
David Flood’s Canterbury Cathedral Choir – singing Benjamin’s Ceremony of Carol
- Now this is an area that NDS did well and less so the NDAC. The Hugo in my opinion beats both. The Canterbury Cathedral reverb is magnificent yet subtle and the Harp accompanying the choristers provides initiates a great multitonal reverb with a lovely range of textures and subtle dynamics. The lead soprano chorister is Joel Whitewood and his voice, although soprano, sounds full and textured with lovely intonation. The final track, Recession, is outstanding and nerve tingling. Wow. I have never hear my ATCs sound like that.
Other female singers.
- By now I started to get a feel that voices sound rather special on this DAC. So I listened to Francois Hardy – she sounded wonderfully Gallic and sensual with the Hugo holding nothing back – definitely need a cold shower after that…
- Then one of my all time favourites, Sandy Denny, and a gig recording of her singing The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. The technical quality of the recording is not outstanding – but the detail, the sound of her moving around the microphone provides and her wonderful phrasing and close mic technique provides a delightful and insightful recording – again nerve tingling.
Jazz Clarinet
- I find clarinet a great test. When you a clarinet acoustically live there are lots of textures and tomes that really enhance the sound. Often this appears lost on replay. I played Evan Christopher, Django a la Creole - Finesse. It was gorgeous, the mids through to treble worked naturally and dynamically as a whole on the clarinet. All those complex textures and tones just seemed to appear in the room. It sounded authentic. No brightness or dullness. – and on Tropical Moon there is a wonderful interplay between a guitar and clarinet where the texture differences really seem to add to the musical performance.
Rock & Pop
- Charlie Blackwell – The Girl of My Beest Friend. Now this sounds fab on the NDAC. The Hugo does well, the bass bounces – perhaps not quite as rhythmically driven as the NDAC but sounds more natural.
- Specials – Ghost Town. Sounds awesome with great weight and vocals – with the Hammond like accompaniment and drums really providing a great sound. It all sounds as it should with an infectious timing and pace that you just cant sit still to. I even heard new notes played by the guitar in the chorus.
- Deadmau5 – Sofi Needs a Ladder. A great juvenile track that needs to be played loud. It has ultra low and loud bass line with deep club type drum line with lots of rich harmonics. Your speaker cones will have a workout when you play this. Timing needs to be spot on – as there is some interesting timing interplay. The Hugo dishes it up perfectly – and I hear some new production/mixing techniques that I never noticed before – awesome.
So I could go on – I listened to the Wall, The Black Dyke Brass Band, Johnny Cash at San Quentin, The Clash, Buzzcocks, Jean Michel Jarre, Chopin, Edith Piaf – and time after time the Hugo dished up detail and musicality – with no hardness – and a wonderfully natural tonal balance that makes piano, violin, brass band, wood wind, voices sound natural and real and vibrant with seemingly great timing.
So is there anything I don’t like? Well its small and a little fiddly – it has limited SPDIF inputs – and perhaps the very deep bass is a little softer than the NDAC/555PS I have been used to… but other than that I can’t fault it. It makes my regular Red Book music sound so real and wonderfully enjoyable – and my Naim NAC/NAP has never sounded so good.
I shall be ordering one.
Simon
Simon - are you telling us that you are going to ditch your Naim source for the Hugo ?
A summary of the Hugo DAC connected to the NDX SPDIF digital source being streamed with 44.1/16 WAV media. This is turn is connected to a NAC282/NAP250.2 with HiCapDR and ATC SCM19 speakers. The interconnect is a DIN to phono Hiline cable.
The comparison has been made with a NDAC/555PS and NDS/555PS.
After having left the Hugo powered up for around 24 hours and fully chanrged the sound opened out and I started to seriously listen. I have a rather eclectic taste in music and so what follows is list of some of my tracks/albums that I am very familiar with.
30s/40s Boogie Woogie
- Tiny Bradshaw; Shout, Sister, Shout. A 1934 recording – so not hifi – but the Hugo finds great pace and rhythm – and no hint of stridency.
- Will Bradley & His Orchestra; Scrub Me, Mama, With a Boogie Beat. A 1940’s recording but has a sweet Big Band texture with a really satisfying and realistic drum set and percussion. The timing and the textures of his voice are impressive. There is no thinness and plenty of detail and organicness for a 1940’s recoding.
- Louis Jordan; Choo Choo Ch’Boogie; Again authentic sweet brass with lots of harmonics and textures, a lovely textured Jordan voice and a double bass strutting its stuff convincingly and enjoyably well. Great timing and pace.
50s/60s Jazz
- Atlantic Jazz Vocals Volume 1: A track sung by George Weir has an immediate and yet mellow response. The close mic technique working really well. Again the voice has loads of texture and overtones.
- Sylvia Syms; a lovely female jazz voice, mellow and emotional. The Hugo really digs out the emotion. The harmonic and textures from the Hugo playing woodwind/Trumpet and Piano all sound accurate and emotional. No dryness or dullness – just lots of textures.
- The jazz drums sounds lifelike and dynamic with a great dynamic response that really shifts the air in the room to give that jazz club feel. Impressive for 50s/60s recording.
David Flood’s Canterbury Cathedral Choir – singing Benjamin’s Ceremony of Carol
- Now this is an area that NDS did well and less so the NDAC. The Hugo in my opinion beats both. The Canterbury Cathedral reverb is magnificent yet subtle and the Harp accompanying the choristers provides initiates a great multitonal reverb with a lovely range of textures and subtle dynamics. The lead soprano chorister is Joel Whitewood and his voice, although soprano, sounds full and textured with lovely intonation. The final track, Recession, is outstanding and nerve tingling. Wow. I have never hear my ATCs sound like that.
Other female singers.
- By now I started to get a feel that voices sound rather special on this DAC. So I listened to Francois Hardy – she sounded wonderfully Gallic and sensual with the Hugo holding nothing back – definitely need a cold shower after that…
- Then one of my all time favourites, Sandy Denny, and a gig recording of her singing The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. The technical quality of the recording is not outstanding – but the detail, the sound of her moving around the microphone provides and her wonderful phrasing and close mic technique provides a delightful and insightful recording – again nerve tingling.
Jazz Clarinet
- I find clarinet a great test. When you a clarinet acoustically live there are lots of textures and tomes that really enhance the sound. Often this appears lost on replay. I played Evan Christopher, Django a la Creole - Finesse. It was gorgeous, the mids through to treble worked naturally and dynamically as a whole on the clarinet. All those complex textures and tones just seemed to appear in the room. It sounded authentic. No brightness or dullness. – and on Tropical Moon there is a wonderful interplay between a guitar and clarinet where the texture differences really seem to add to the musical performance.
Rock & Pop
- Charlie Blackwell – The Girl of My Beest Friend. Now this sounds fab on the NDAC. The Hugo does well, the bass bounces – perhaps not quite as rhythmically driven as the NDAC but sounds more natural.
- Specials – Ghost Town. Sounds awesome with great weight and vocals – with the Hammond like accompaniment and drums really providing a great sound. It all sounds as it should with an infectious timing and pace that you just cant sit still to. I even heard new notes played by the guitar in the chorus.
- Deadmau5 – Sofi Needs a Ladder. A great juvenile track that needs to be played loud. It has ultra low and loud bass line with deep club type drum line with lots of rich harmonics. Your speaker cones will have a workout when you play this. Timing needs to be spot on – as there is some interesting timing interplay. The Hugo dishes it up perfectly – and I hear some new production/mixing techniques that I never noticed before – awesome.
So I could go on – I listened to the Wall, The Black Dyke Brass Band, Johnny Cash at San Quentin, The Clash, Buzzcocks, Jean Michel Jarre, Chopin, Edith Piaf – and time after time the Hugo dished up detail and musicality – with no hardness – and a wonderfully natural tonal balance that makes piano, violin, brass band, wood wind, voices sound natural and real and vibrant with seemingly great timing.
So is there anything I don’t like? Well its small and a little fiddly – it has limited SPDIF inputs – and perhaps the very deep bass is a little softer than the NDAC/555PS I have been used to… but other than that I can’t fault it. It makes my regular Red Book music sound so real and wonderfully enjoyable – and my Naim NAC/NAP has never sounded so good.
I shall be ordering one.
Simon
Simon, will you continue feeding the Hugo with the NDX?
I asked Rob Watts if he could explain in layman's terms what is meant by "tap length" in his WTA filter. Here is his reply :
I will try to explain simply, but it is not easy. The interpolation filter is an FIR filter. This has delayed audio data. Each delayed data is multiplied by a coefficient, and all these multiplications are summed together, and the summed result is the interpolated value. Now the delayed data is held in a delay line, and is tapped into by a multiplier - hence the term taps. The coefficient is calculated by an algorithm, and in Hugo this is the WTA algorithm. This has been developed over many years, and what I am trying to do is maximize the sound quality performance, by improving the way the timing is reconstructed.
Now if you look at the mathematics, if you want to reconstruct the original bandwidth limited perfectly (that is all the timing of transients will be perfectly reproduced) then you need an infinite number of taps for the filter. When you start reducing the number of taps, then the timing accuracy degrades, which has very important subjective consequences. Hugo has the highest tap length filter of any DAC available at any price, which as you identify, is one substantial reason for it's naturalness. With Hugo, it has a 26,368 taps. This means for every sample of CD data, there are 26,368 multiplications and additions going on. To do this, I use 16 customized parallel DSP cores, each one running at 208 MHz. So there is a lot of DSP horsepower in Hugo.
A summary of the Hugo DAC connected to the NDX SPDIF digital source being streamed with 44.1/16 WAV media. This is turn is connected to a NAC282/NAP250.2 with HiCapDR and ATC SCM19 speakers. The interconnect is a DIN to phono Hiline cable.
The comparison has been made with a NDAC/555PS and NDS/555PS.
After having left the Hugo powered up for around 24 hours and fully chanrged the sound opened out and I started to seriously listen. I have a rather eclectic taste in music and so what follows is list of some of my tracks/albums that I am very familiar with.
30s/40s Boogie Woogie
- Tiny Bradshaw; Shout, Sister, Shout. A 1934 recording – so not hifi – but the Hugo finds great pace and rhythm – and no hint of stridency.
- Will Bradley & His Orchestra; Scrub Me, Mama, With a Boogie Beat. A 1940’s recording but has a sweet Big Band texture with a really satisfying and realistic drum set and percussion. The timing and the textures of his voice are impressive. There is no thinness and plenty of detail and organicness for a 1940’s recoding.
- Louis Jordan; Choo Choo Ch’Boogie; Again authentic sweet brass with lots of harmonics and textures, a lovely textured Jordan voice and a double bass strutting its stuff convincingly and enjoyably well. Great timing and pace.
50s/60s Jazz
- Atlantic Jazz Vocals Volume 1: A track sung by George Weir has an immediate and yet mellow response. The close mic technique working really well. Again the voice has loads of texture and overtones.
- Sylvia Syms; a lovely female jazz voice, mellow and emotional. The Hugo really digs out the emotion. The harmonic and textures from the Hugo playing woodwind/Trumpet and Piano all sound accurate and emotional. No dryness or dullness – just lots of textures.
- The jazz drums sounds lifelike and dynamic with a great dynamic response that really shifts the air in the room to give that jazz club feel. Impressive for 50s/60s recording.
David Flood’s Canterbury Cathedral Choir – singing Benjamin’s Ceremony of Carol
- Now this is an area that NDS did well and less so the NDAC. The Hugo in my opinion beats both. The Canterbury Cathedral reverb is magnificent yet subtle and the Harp accompanying the choristers provides initiates a great multitonal reverb with a lovely range of textures and subtle dynamics. The lead soprano chorister is Joel Whitewood and his voice, although soprano, sounds full and textured with lovely intonation. The final track, Recession, is outstanding and nerve tingling. Wow. I have never hear my ATCs sound like that.
Other female singers.
- By now I started to get a feel that voices sound rather special on this DAC. So I listened to Francois Hardy – she sounded wonderfully Gallic and sensual with the Hugo holding nothing back – definitely need a cold shower after that…
- Then one of my all time favourites, Sandy Denny, and a gig recording of her singing The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. The technical quality of the recording is not outstanding – but the detail, the sound of her moving around the microphone provides and her wonderful phrasing and close mic technique provides a delightful and insightful recording – again nerve tingling.
Jazz Clarinet
- I find clarinet a great test. When you a clarinet acoustically live there are lots of textures and tomes that really enhance the sound. Often this appears lost on replay. I played Evan Christopher, Django a la Creole - Finesse. It was gorgeous, the mids through to treble worked naturally and dynamically as a whole on the clarinet. All those complex textures and tones just seemed to appear in the room. It sounded authentic. No brightness or dullness. – and on Tropical Moon there is a wonderful interplay between a guitar and clarinet where the texture differences really seem to add to the musical performance.
Rock & Pop
- Charlie Blackwell – The Girl of My Beest Friend. Now this sounds fab on the NDAC. The Hugo does well, the bass bounces – perhaps not quite as rhythmically driven as the NDAC but sounds more natural.
- Specials – Ghost Town. Sounds awesome with great weight and vocals – with the Hammond like accompaniment and drums really providing a great sound. It all sounds as it should with an infectious timing and pace that you just cant sit still to. I even heard new notes played by the guitar in the chorus.
- Deadmau5 – Sofi Needs a Ladder. A great juvenile track that needs to be played loud. It has ultra low and loud bass line with deep club type drum line with lots of rich harmonics. Your speaker cones will have a workout when you play this. Timing needs to be spot on – as there is some interesting timing interplay. The Hugo dishes it up perfectly – and I hear some new production/mixing techniques that I never noticed before – awesome.
So I could go on – I listened to the Wall, The Black Dyke Brass Band, Johnny Cash at San Quentin, The Clash, Buzzcocks, Jean Michel Jarre, Chopin, Edith Piaf – and time after time the Hugo dished up detail and musicality – with no hardness – and a wonderfully natural tonal balance that makes piano, violin, brass band, wood wind, voices sound natural and real and vibrant with seemingly great timing.
So is there anything I don’t like? Well its small and a little fiddly – it has limited SPDIF inputs – and perhaps the very deep bass is a little softer than the NDAC/555PS I have been used to… but other than that I can’t fault it. It makes my regular Red Book music sound so real and wonderfully enjoyable – and my Naim NAC/NAP has never sounded so good.
I shall be ordering one.
Simon
Great write up, Simon.
I asked Rob Watts if he could explain in layman's terms what is meant by "tap length" in his WTA filter. Here is his reply :
I will try to explain simply, but it is not easy. The interpolation filter is an FIR filter. This has delayed audio data. Each delayed data is multiplied by a coefficient, and all these multiplications are summed together, and the summed result is the interpolated value. Now the delayed data is held in a delay line, and is tapped into by a multiplier - hence the term taps. The coefficient is calculated by an algorithm, and in Hugo this is the WTA algorithm. This has been developed over many years, and what I am trying to do is maximize the sound quality performance, by improving the way the timing is reconstructed.
Now if you look at the mathematics, if you want to reconstruct the original bandwidth limited perfectly (that is all the timing of transients will be perfectly reproduced) then you need an infinite number of taps for the filter. When you start reducing the number of taps, then the timing accuracy degrades, which has very important subjective consequences. Hugo has the highest tap length filter of any DAC available at any price, which as you identify, is one substantial reason for it's naturalness. With Hugo, it has a 26,368 taps. This means for every sample of CD data, there are 26,368 multiplications and additions going on. To do this, I use 16 customized parallel DSP cores, each one running at 208 MHz. So there is a lot of DSP horsepower in Hugo.
Well, if 26k permutations are possible with this low power and low power consumption cluster of cores, I wonder what would be possible if a slightly more powerful processing set up was deployed .... 
Nice review Simon and an excellent choice of source material. 
Dave
It is not so easy to believe that something so small and in that price range can deliver so much, but world changes. Hugo is changing the way what DAC's are meant to be, and the bar is raised pretty high at the moment.
Thanks Simon for such an extensive report!
Thanks Simon for this insightful review!
Dave - thanks for introducing me to Evan Christopher -
Bert - I think I probably will yes.
Pete - yes I like my NDX - I love it usability and it feeds the Hugo perfectly.
Jan - the term 'taps' is also referred to coefficients or Filter Length. When reconstructing audio from digital data one passes the data through a transformation filter. (often a FIR) This filter is like a window that passes along the stream of data. The longer the window, the more accurately the data is filtered with out artefacting such as ringing and a lack of precision and loss of fine / micro detail. Theoretically for a perfectly reconstructed audio signal the filter needs to be as long as the signal itself. In the real world this isn't achievable for audio, so a compromise is chosen. In the earlier days a larger number of taps - or longer filter lengths - required more processing power and current that could be often economically applied accurately - but new technology allows a larger amount of processing power with low power and still retain precision - and the Hugo appears to be an example of this.
This might be of interest - a little technical - but has some diagrams of impact of short and long filter lengths
http://www.vyssotski.ch/Basics...n_of_FIR_Filters.pdf
Jude - thanks for the remarks.
Simon
Simon - a bit OTT as just a S/PDIF source, but have you tried your 555PS on the NDX with the Hugo ?
Good write up too 
James
Fantastic write up Simon. You are certainly able to put into words what the rest of us have been hearing with Hugo.
i have been playing around with feeding Hugo via USB from a laptop running Jriver. It is hugely configurable but what has come to light, at least for me, is that feeding flac files into the NDX rather than wav sounds a lot clearer, less veiled.
Also im finding a much bigger sound stage feeding from the laptop. Need to try a better laptop first as mine is struggling, so still undecided which i prefer.
anyone done any comparisons.
Graeme
As you'r using JRiver...try Kernel Streaming in device set up rather than Asio or Wasapi, as well as DSD conversion on fly, especially 24/96 or 24/192 files, if you had some. Or, you can convert them first and play them as DSD. The best of best, is to get some native DSD files, you can find some fee downloads at Blue Coast Records.
Hi cvrle
I will try that. Just out of interest do you know what the difference between the drivers is. I hadn't even noticed the kernel mode.
I tried the conversion to DSD on the fly but this netbook just isnt powerful enough unfortunately. Not sure if dbpoweramp can convert them, but may give it a try.
Graeme
Hi Graeme,
Tools-Options-Audio-Audio Device-Last line "more", open it-you should see Hugo Kernel, or so.
Sorry to heat that your processor is slow to do conversion on fly, but you can use either JRiver or DbPower to convert it first. I like it, so you may want to give try, it'll help you in making of your decision.
Cvrle
can you tell me where i can find the convert tools for this.
dbpoweramp doesn't seem to have DSD as an option to convert files into in either file or batch converter.
Jriver i can find a converter
Many thanks
Graeme
This might be of interest - a little technical - but has some diagrams of impact of short and long filter lengths
http://www.vyssotski.ch/Basics...n_of_FIR_Filters.pdf
Thanks Simon... my head hurts.
... a little technical ... 
As you'r using JRiver...try Kernel Streaming in device set up rather than Asio or Wasapi, as well as DSD conversion on fly, especially 24/96 or 24/192 files, if you had some. Or, you can convert them first and play them as DSD. The best of best, is to get some native DSD files, you can find some fee downloads at Blue Coast Records.
Hi cvrle
I will try that. Just out of interest do you know what the difference between the drivers is. I hadn't even noticed the kernel mode.
I tried the conversion to DSD on the fly but this netbook just isnt powerful enough unfortunately. Not sure if dbpoweramp can convert them, but may give it a try.
Graeme
Hi Graeme,
Tools-Options-Audio-Audio Device-Last line "more", open it-you should see Hugo Kernel, or so.
Sorry to heat that your processor is slow to do conversion on fly, but you can use either JRiver or DbPower to convert it first. I like it, so you may want to give try, it'll help you in making of your decision.
Cvrle
can you tell me where i can find the convert tools for this.
dbpoweramp doesn't seem to have DSD as an option to convert files into in either file or batch converter.
Jriver i can find a converter
Many thanks
Graeme
-Locate your album either in the album view or choosing explorer of the folders
-Highlight tracks or just use the whole album on the top of the view
-Click right button
-You should see option “Library Tools”, open it
-You should see “Convert Format”, click on it
-In the left bottom corner you will see dialog box where you would chose output format
-If you click to “Options” you would be able to set your location for the output files. You may want the same folder as original files are located in, or you want them somewhere else.
I hope this helps….