Chord Hugo 2 Review (Portable DAC & HP Amp)

[Ken Tajalli]

Where are these people hiding?

They could be hiding among those who vote on a device in reviews.
Specially those who have never seen nor examined it.
Look there, but beware there maybe reflections there!

 

[greg88rx]

Could someone help interpret these results? Where is the sweet spot (range) with the volume control wheel on Hugo 2? My Hugo 2 is in use as a preamp via RCA cables into my power amp then into my speakers. These graphs seem to show an optimal voltage range. I don't have a practical way to measure the output voltage, but is there a way to convert that approximately to the colors on the volume control wheel on the Hugo 2?

Secondly, and maybe slightly off topic, my power amp has three levels of gain adjustment (high, med, low). Based on the answer to the previous question after getting the Hugo 2 output in the ideal range I intuitively expect that I would then adjust the gain toggle to a general desired listening level and leave that gain parked while fine tuning the volume on my Hugo 2. Am I thinking correctly about this?

 

[staticV3]

Where is the sweet spot (range) with the volume control wheel on Hugo 2? These graphs seem to show an optimal voltage range. I don't have a practical way to measure the output voltage

You can measure the output voltage with a $10 multimeter. Very handy for all things audio.

 

[Ken Tajalli]

Could someone help interpret these results? Where is the sweet spot (range) with the volume control wheel on Hugo 2? My Hugo 2 is in use as a preamp via RCA cables into my power amp then into my speakers. These graphs seem to show an optimal voltage range. I don't have a practical way to measure the output voltage, but is there a way to convert that approximately to the colors on the volume control wheel on the Hugo 2?

Secondly, and maybe slightly off topic, my power amp has three levels of gain adjustment (high, med, low). Based on the answer to the previous question after getting the Hugo 2 output in the ideal range I intuitively expect that I would then adjust the gain toggle to a general desired listening level and leave that gain parked while fine tuning the volume on my Hugo 2. Am I thinking correctly about this?

Depends on your poweramp.
Hugo2 can output almost 5V, that's almost +8dB compared to a standard DAC output.
Simple test is, put it on green volume level, play something, the sound volume from speakers should be lowish, like night time listening, if it is not, switch your poweramp input sensitivity, to achieve that.
measuring the output with a voltmeter , gets you nowhere.
The sensitivity of your speakers, max. power of your amps, average level of a particular recording, all and all contribute to your dilemma .
Just use the commonsense approach above, and you are golden.