Is this an amplifier or is it performance art?
Chord Electronics, not the cable guys, make futuristic, quirky, stunning and mental hi-fi equipment.
Not saying they are mental engineers though as their lead digital guy, Rob Watts, designed FPGA dacs and filters long before other manufacturers caught on. DACs loom large in the Chord portfolio with names like Mojo, Qutest, Hugo and Dave pushing the most amazing sampling rates.
Though famous for digital technology they also know their onions around amplifiers and this new one pictured above is pretty special.
This is the new entry level of their Ultima range, with amplifiers going up to over £ 100,000 this is top value at only £ 8500!
Pick it up though and this it feels anything but cheap! I referred to Chord and quirky and this has it's cool part too.
Chord love their colour codes.
What input are you on? Don't know, what colour is the ring round the the volume? Yellow, Blue, green?
On the Hugo TT2 the roller ball for volume changes colour as you change volume, cool!
This amplifier is gorgeous, beautifully engineered and sounds great.
I've been playing it with Kef Reference Ones, excellent combination.
As other manufacturers, Linn and Naim, are moving to having streamers built in to their amplifiers this is an old school lots of guts and dynamics real amplifier. And you'll love it!
We now have this on demonstration along with HugoTT2, M Scaler, Qutest and Huei, sold a few Mojo2s as well.
Drop us a line to hear this behemoth.
Also later this year we will host a Chord demo event so drop me a line if you're interested in that.
We hope that Doug Graham from Chord will be here to explain more of their philosophy and play a few tunes.
We might also see a new modular amplifier, welcome little Suzi !
