 Many DACs offer upsampling, even DAC chips costing only several euros. Why then does the CORT TT-UGO M-scaler cost 4250 euros including VAT? And why do I want one? Upsampling, or upscaling as CORT names it, changes the sampling frequency of an audio signal to a higher one. Initially almost everyone thought that it sounded better because of why the frequency bands offered. The highest frequency that a digital signal can carry without artifacts is half the sampling rate, as we all know. But as we now might know, this isn't a reason at all for upsampling. But before I dive into that, let's first see where the UGO TT-M Scaler fits into your stereo. I had the M-scaler plus day for two weeks, where in the first week I concentrated on the DAVE DAC. The M-scaler is in fact an add-on for some CORT DACs, the DAVE, the UGO TT-2 and the Q-Test. It can also be used with other DACs, but I did the review with the DAVE. In a setup that uses an amp, a set of speakers, and the DAVE, the M-scaler is connected to the DAVE over two B and C cables. This way it can send a 705.6 or 768 kHz PCM to the DAVE, where the B and C1 input has to be selected. Source selection is now done on the M-scaler, so when you connect a computer or laptop to the M-scaler over USB spitter for toss link, the corresponding input on the M-scaler has to be selected. If you use a network player that has to be connected to the M-scaler over either USB spitter for toss link depending on the interface is present. Controlling the player then is usually done on a tablet or smartphone. The M-scaler has five inputs so several sources can be connected, like a game console and a TV or setup box. If you still play CDs, and there is nothing wrong with that, you can still connect a CD player to that too, clearly improving the sound quality. The housing is machined from slabs of aluminium. In good tradition it has a porthole on the top. This time not showing the circuit board, but another metal layer below. It measures 235 x 238 x 40 mm and weighs 2.55 kg. Along the front there are six ball shaped buttons that are illuminated to indicate the function being active. The left one switches on a shorter filter for when you play the TV sound or any other video over the M-scaler, which is most recommendable by the way. Although the TV sound generally isn't as good as CD quality and the upsampling for the video is simpler, it does give the TV sound the boost. The second button is the input selector. As with all chord products that use ball buttons, colors indicate what is selected. It's a bit odd, but you get used to it. And the remote control lets you select inputs directly. The third button selects the output sampling frequency, passed through 2 x 4 x 60 x 44.1 or 48 kW. If you use a single output, the highest sampling frequency is 8 x base. The infrared sensor is situated on the front. The right three ball buttons are primarily for a not yet introduced power DAC that does the conversion and amplification in one go, for as far as I know now. The DX UP only functions as an indicator for the incoming sampling frequency. The two other buttons seem to be volume controls for the future product. On the left the 15 volts DC power inlet, a street mode power supply comes with a unit. To the right, two speed of inputs, two toss link inputs and a USB audio class 2 input. Then the output section with one toss link output that is limited to 192 kHz sampling, one speed of output that supports up to 384 kHz and the dual BNC output that goes to 768 kHz of which usage is limited to the aforementioned core DACs. Normally the next chapter is about the inside but although it is possible to open the housing, the second metal housing internally has been screwed in using four screws of which one is a very special model with only two small holes in it. It is obvious that visitors are not welcome. What makes the WTA filter different from what is normally used? I am going to cut corners to explain this. Rob Watts did several interviews and presentations covering this and that can be found on YouTube. The most informative and in-depth one is done by Passion for Sound. The video call picture quality is rather poor. The content is extremely informative. Here I will give a very simplified version. Sampling theory in general is about a continuous signal, something music isn't. These are signals that can start and stop. Let's look at a sine wave pulse. In most reconstruction filters a sample and hold circuit is used. It samples the average amplitude over one sample period and uses that value for further processing. This can lead to the following results. As you can see there is a short delay but that's not the problem. It is the amplitude that slowly increases and thus ruins the transient behavior. In his famous paper A Hierarchical Approach to Archiving and Distribution, paragraph 4.2 Reconstruction, Bob Stewart also mentioned this transient problem and suggests the use of triangular bins. It is unclear to me if MQA does something in that direction. The WTA filter works differently. It uses a so called sync X over X signal that looks roughly like this. If you reconstruct the signal from sync impulse responses, where the central peak equals the sampled value, you in fact increase the time resolution since the inter-sample level is the sum of the signal in between the sampling points. And the more sync impulses used, the higher the time resolution. Again, this is a very simplified explanation. Rob Watts told me in 2016, when he introduced the DAVE, that he had calculated that he would need a 1 million tap filter to have a filter that is extremely close to perfection. He must have been working on the 1 million tap M-scaler already since that is introduced in 2018. Watts also emphasized the importance of transients for they are very important for the perception of pitch, soundstage and timbre. The M-scaler is pretty straightforward to use, especially if you use the remote control. Select the input and the output sampling rate and your set. Want it simpler? No problem. Select the auto input mode and the M-scaler will select the input that sees an incoming signal. Other sources need to be switched off then of course. Set the video function on auto and it will set the video filter automatically when the incoming signal is 48 kHz. For video the 600 ms delay the M-scaler normally has, processing cost time, will bring the audio out of sync with the video. I am not very good in colors but can see the sampling rate the DAVE receives in the display. To test the M-scaler I use my setup 1 that uses the Air AX520 to power the audio-physics Scorpio loudspeakers over AudioQuest Robinhood 0 cables. The DAVE was connected to the M over Grimm SQM balanced interlinks. The M-scaler was connected to the DAVE using two professional video BNC cables while it received the digital audio signal over an AudioQuest Diamond USB A to B cable from the Aurelic AirSG2 network player. It was connected to the network over the EnoSystem Ethernet filter to the SOtM SNH10G network switch. The Intel NUC10i7 has a 128 GB M.2 SSD a system drive and an 8 TB SATA SSD that holds the music files. It runs Roon Rock, is placed on the third floor and is connected to a Zistel switch that in turn is connected to the SOtM switch over fiber optics. See about my reference setups November 2020. Playback was controlled over an iPad Pro. In last week's video I was extremely enthusiastic about the sound quality of the Core DAVE DAC. If you haven't watched that video, do that now. For the M-scaler keeps all that but adds even more texture to an even deeper and more open low end. And it further improves the soundstage drastically. It's not only a lot deeper and wider, it has extremely credible placement of instruments in that space. As if my house twice as wide. Some say that you shouldn't use the DAVE without the M-scaler and I understand this completely. But it doesn't do the DAVE justice since stand alone is already extremely good. But the combination brings you so close to audio nirvana. Some say that the DAVE or this combination sounds sharp or thin. I understand that, for the DAVE and the M-scaler combo doesn't smear out lows and thus will excite less room modes. Some say that the DAVE or this combination sounds sharp or thin. I understand that, for the DAVE and M-scaler combo doesn't smear out lows and thus will excite room modes far less. A warm sounding amp can add to that smearing. In those cases where a lot of acoustic measures are taken, remove some of it and then evaluate the DAVE and the M-scaler combo again. I'm sure you will be amazed. It certainly lives up to the theoretical claims what's made. Better tensions will improve the perception of low frequencies. Check. They provide clearly better perception of the spatial information and captured in the recording. Check. And they keep timbre better intact. Check. Then I have been asked to tie the Ferrum Hipsis power supply instead of the supplied one. There were reports that would sound better. As often with digital to digital equipment, I found it degraded the sound. Especially the resolution and texture of low frequency was ruined, making the sound woolly muddy. It might be a solution for those that need coloration in the low frequencies due to limitations of the amp or, for instance, because of the overly used of bass traps to compensate for equipment that causes time smearing in the lows. By the way, I have no scientific proof of this opinion, but when low frequencies are smeared over time, room modes get easier excited. At least, that's my experience. I was lent the combination for two weeks and the first week I only worked on the DAVE. The second week I spent on the amp scaler and that was short, so I limited myself to the DAVE as DAG. I did try if the dual B&C output would work with the Denafrips DAGs. My colleague Jafrinstra of alphaaudio.nl who is working on Denafrips reviews was so kind to work with me on this attempt. Unfortunately it didn't work. I used Neutrik digital audio impedance transformers to convert from SPDIF to AS-EBU and that worked on a single cable connection, but not when we used the dual cable setup. In the future I might test the amp scaler on other DAGs if I manage to set that up. And there is a good chance that will happen, for I am extremely tempted to crash the piggy bank. And on that bombshell we come to the end of this show. As usual there will be a new video next Friday at 5 pm central european time. If you don't want to miss that, subscribe to this channel or follow me on the social media so you will be informed when new videos are out. Help me reach even more people by giving this video a thumb up or link to this video in the social media. It is much appreciated. Many thanks to those viewers that support this channel financially. It keeps me independent and lets me improve the channel further. If that makes you feel like supporting my work too, the links are in the comments below this video on Youtube. I am Hans Beekhuyzen, thank you for watching and see you in the next show or on theHBproject.com. And whatever you do, enjoy the music.