Integrated Amplifiers

Here's a perfect example of why we use test and measurement as an investigative tool at Hi-Fi News. Without it we'd be trotting out the one specification that's on offer – a power output of 10W/8ohm. But you deserve better, so we've uncovered the real story. In practice, for its main amplifier, Chord employs two pairs of, for this purpose, rather over-specified 'TrenchFET' power transistors from Vishay. These are driven via a comparator that prevents peak clipping but, instead, collapses one half of the PSU rail if an over-current condition is sensed. In practice, the Anni will not sustain a continuous 10W/8ohm – a figure of 5W/8ohm is more likely.

Chord is smarter than this, of course, so the circuit is configured for 'real life/music-like' signals that are dynamic rather than unvarying. Under these conditions [see inset Graph] the Anni delivers a fine 13W, 20W, 35W and 60W into 8, 4, 2 and 1ohm loads [black, red, blue and green traces, respectively]. Hence the reason the Anni is consistently reported as sounding/performing rather beefier than that 10W specification might suggest...

What else? The two gain options are +5.1dB and +13.7dB while, at 1W/8ohm, distortion is 0.02-0.04% through bass and midband, increasing markedly at high treble frequencies to 0.7%/10kHz and 5%/20kHz. The response shows a similar low bass boost to that seen via the headphone output while the A-wtd S/N ratio is just a little below average at 81dB (re. 0dBW). PM