A few months ago we received our demo and stock Hugo TT DACs. We listened to the TT with a familiar Naim streamer source and hooked it up to our Naim system. After all, this is how a lot of people have been using the smaller, groundbreaking Hugo. It’s great this way too. The TT is a whole lot better than the original portable Hugo or the new 2Qute.
Mind you, my painfully fair description of it offering more of the same fundamental qualities possibly led many to figure that the steps were modest. I reiterate; it’s a substantial improvement. We did, however, run into something of a problem.
If you pick up a Naim (or Arcam, Linn, Rega, ATC and a gazillion other brands) handset and change the volume level and the Hugo TT will change digital input. Chord had committed a serious faux pas. The RC5 codes are the most commonly used, particularly for volume adjustment but, because Chord use something else, they thought nothing of the overlap.
The result was that our demo, thankfully silver, Hugo TT sat there with a small blu-tak ‘nipple’ covering up the IR window. Not a great look but less obvious than it would have been with a black one.
To Chord’s credit, they leapt into action very quickly and the firmware has now been modified to resolve the issue. The TT can now be used in mixed brand systems and, of course, it still sounds magnificent. Our stock TT’s are from the revised batches.
So let’s give the TT a fresh shove into the spotlight. Sure, the Chord Dave is bound to be better. But it will cost over £5k more. The TT could well be the sweet spot in the range. And it has full remote control too. Now.
Alastair