Chord "Mojo"

I like my mojo, I think it's great for portable solution... But I have very limited dac experience. I definitely think it's overrated though, as I hear minor improvements over some of my daps. I am not even sure I hear any improvements over my Cowon P1 or S.

@mscott58 I foresee you hearing the Sony NW-WM1Z... It's in your future.

 

Overpriced compared to what? I'm not aware of any product out there with the same feature set that's close to the price.

"Overpriced" and "more than I'm willing to pay" are not synonymous.

 

Well, we know that the sound depends upon the digital connection(Toslink/Coax/USB), depends upon the transport (DAP/Phone/CD Player/PC), depends upon the type of phone and type of cable (Pure Silver, Pure Copper, Silver Coated Copper and also different types of quality copper cables), depends upon the mother board, and phones (Different PC/Phones will have different sound even if you keep the audio player and cable same).

So moral of the story that i have faith in Chord, so i believe their transport will sound best with Mojo.. well that's my assumption.. hope i will be correct..

Till that time i am happy with Hidizs AP60(128 GB) + Forza Micro USB + Mojo + HD650 (Cardas Cable) / Bleck Zen !

 

@Torq What would you say is beter? How does the Meridian Explorer and Audioquest Red compare for example?

 

I do not think the Raspeberry Pi is really an alternative here as it is not portable, which is the whole point of the Poly...I think.

 

As a Mojo owner, if Poly gives the pure Mojo experience, eliminating all source/connection related issues, as John Franks say it does, it might be worth its price for me. However, its price is terribly close to Metrum Musette NOS Dac which is a product I'm very interested in.

 

Man I was hoping the Poly would be optically coupled to the Mojo to alleviate that USB altogether ... I'm pretty sure a direct coupled TOSLink - with the proper (non off the shelf) receiver - can do the highest sampling rates.

I actually couldn't see the USB connectors when I looked at the pictures on my phone. There had to be at least one for charging, though.

 

That would assume that the existing TOSlink receiver in the Mojo was "proper" enough, mind. Given how badly other bits of the connectivity were half-assed, I'd not want to make any assumptions.

The Mojo over USB can sound OK, if it's clean, we know that. Given than the Mojo has such an awful USB input, the Poly will want to be a lot better engineered to not suffer all the same problems- especially when the radios are on. Their track record with this stuff isn't great- ergonomics and operational miscellanea have never been Chord's strong suit.

If it's super-clean, all well and good, it would make a somewhat clumsy mobile source that sounds not quite as good as a similarly priced Sony DAP. That's fine, if that's what you want, of course.

Obviously, though, there's only so much on the table to gain from a clean source- and a Mojo fed from a clean source is still deeply underwhelming feeding a semi-decent desktop amp, especially when you have the (far cheaper) Modi Multibit to compare it to. That makes it quite an underwhelming desktop streamer, when you could build something around a Modi Multibit and a Raspberry Pi (with a Wyrd or a nice S/PDIF hat) which will blow it out of the water in terms of sound quality- for a lot less.

(Sorry, Clem, you understand all of this, I know. Some of the bug-eyed fanboys who don't grok how stuff works could probably do with constant reminders, though- forgive me!)

 

Why do you keep repeating "Modi Multibit + Raspberry Pi will destroy Mojo in terms of SQ" ? It's getting a bit repetitive.

Schiit products I've heard has been on the bright side and their amps have problematic treble. I don't know the right term, haze?.. Anyway, I just don't like Schiit house sound. But I don't go to Schiit threads and talk about how shit they are. I just don't care.

I'm not a fan of Chord myself. Hugo, I didn't like. It's far too pricey and has a bright sound signature. Mojo, on the other hand, is reasonably priced and sounds more organic and warm. I prefer it to Schiit amps in terms of sound character. If I were to upgrade, I'd just get a Metrum Menuet and Vioelectric V281. Both are amazing, organic and natural sounding products. But for its price, Mojo is more than good.

 

Because it does.
Tested an approved at work.

Mojo was my go-to all-in-one solution at work for a long time, fed by a Sonicorbiter SE (good USB). I then got the Modi Multibit + Vali2 combo and - after a cheap tube upgrade - the sound was on a different level. It's kinda expected given the portable vs desktop natures of the gears. Unfair advantage, but advantage nonetheless.
I now use the PS Audio UltraLink 2 instead of the Modi Multibit. It doesn't have that deeper 3D sound, but it is more refined all around, as expected from a mid-range DAC of the mid 90s (~$2000).

I do agree about Schiit's voicing (ultimately, I prefer Theta DACs), Hugo being a huge let down (bright and lean sound signature compared to the older Qute stuff, that I loved) and Mojo being good for what it is.

 

Yep, that's right about where I ended up in terms of how I think about Mojo today. Unfortunately I started from a much more enthusiastic position!

I think you'll remain crow-free ... as I'd be surprised if the Shanling M1 on it's own wasn't a better USB source than anything Chord is likely to produce. At least if Chord insists on rolling their own USB code on an FPGA as they clearly don't have that down yet (and that's not even considering the electrical implications).

I think the ship sailed on that one with Mojo already being limited to 24/192 on TOSLINK. Not a problem for PCM, but for the DSD crowd (I'm not one of them), it'd be limited to 1x due to the Mojo's existing receiver.

Because it's true.

It's hard to make a case for Mojo as a desktop solution at $600 today. When it launched it was easier, though it's still an ergonomic cluster f**k.

At $400, and if you're going to use all of it's features/capabilities then it's not bad.

I own both a Mojo and a Modi Multibit among other things, and Modi Multibit does a better job for less than half the price. And adding an amp, with more capability, still comes in at significantly less than Mojo.

 

With a TOSlink cable, yes. But remove that plastic link between transmitter and receiver an you can - potentially - do much better.
Since everything is done in FPGA, there's plenty of room for creativity.

 

Even without a TOSLINK cable, which will certainly help, you can't get around any existing limitations of Mojo's TOSLINK receiver nor can you change the Mojo's FPGA configuration to support faster transfer in the field (FPGAs CAN do this, of course, but Rob Watts has said that his units are NOT field upgradeable/programmable and must be returned to the factory in the unlikley event they ever offer "upgrades").

Now, it's possible that Mojo's TOSLINK receiver is better than needed and could handle higher bit-rates or even a custom protocol. But unless they baked support for that into the original FPGA "code", you're still looking at a return-to-factory to enable it.

As to what they actually did ... no idea!

 

I think Mojo out-performs the AudioQuest Dragonfly Red overall, though the Red doesn't exhibit the same apparent roll-off at the high-end as Mojo and, despite Mojo's "warmer than Hugo/2Qute" signature, the Dragonfly also hits harder in the bass ... at least with my SE846 and original ER4S. Of course, it's also a third the price and about a million times more convenient and practical for mobile use - especially from a phone.

I've taken to leaving the Mojo home and just using the Dragonfly from my phone when I travel. If I'm going to be gone for a while I might bring the Mojo, but I don't use it on the plane anymore, since it's too much of a PITA in comparison.

As for the Meridian Explorer 2 ... it literally only just arrived ... so I can't say anything about that yet (I expect I'll add it to my iFi Micro iDSD Black Label, Mojo, Dragonfly comparison and get that posted this week):

 

He was referring to the Mojo/Poly Stack vs the Modi Multibit/Raspberry for desktop usage.

 

I see that but no one's tested or used Poly yet. We don't know how good it is. Until then saying Modi Multibit/Raspberry Pi is better is not really a comparison, is it? Because he hasn't used Poly, none of us have. You can't carry Modi Multibit around the house with you.

For desktop use, Modi Multibit might be good, I haven't heard it. I hope it's not bright like other Schiit stuff. Now bright sound lovers might indeed prefer Schiit products. I would prefer a Metrum dac and Vioelectric amp as a desktop solution. I was also very impressed by RME ADI 2 Pro. I recently tried it at the dealer and it sounded amazing. I prefer slightly warm sound. We all have preferences.

 

Stop repeating "you haven't heard it". It's going to sound like a Mojo. We've heard Mojos. God damn, I can feel my IQ plummeting every time someone tries to explain this.

 

Compared to Mojo LOTS of things will sound bright, as it always seems rolled off at the top - but that doesn't make them objectively bright.

Given the piss-poor USB implementation that is on Mojo, it seems unlikely that Chord have suddenly "seen the light" and come up with something that magically transforms it's performance. I also find it HIGHLY doubtful that "Poly" will outperform a microRendu or an Auralic Aries in regards to USB playback, particularly into a Mojo. And even when driven in that manner, Mojo still falls behind Modi Multibit.

No you can't run Modi Multibit on the go, but then no one is suggesting you try.

 

Good ear, you're not hearing things, it's actually supposed to be that way. Rob Watts said a while back that he tuned it to be a bit more "relaxed". I suspect that serves an additional purpose of partly masking some of the D/S style treble prickles from a slightly leaner implementation of the typical Chord setup, too.