If you've ever wondered how to get the most out of your favorite music on headphones, you've probably heard of portable DACs and amplifiers. These little boxes promise to turn compressed digital files from your phone or computer into something alive and tangible. But among the sea of options, there is one almost legendary model — the Chord Mojo.
This gadget has been a favorite among music lovers for many years, and for good reason. Its magic lies not only in its technical characteristics, which are impressive in themselves. The main secret of Mojo is in its special, almost analog sound. It is not sterile and cold, but warm, dense, and incredibly emotionally engaging.
Mojo is especially renowned for its low-frequency performance. The bass here is not just a boomy background. It is detailed, elastic, and deep, becoming a real foundation for the entire musical picture. It is the very hook that grabs you from the first notes and does not let go, making you listen to album after album.
In this test, we will try to figure out what makes the Chord Mojo so special. Why is it still relevant today, and how does it manage not only to improve the sound, but also to create that emotional connection with the listener that everyone dreams of?
First emotion
Mojo is cute. A smooth aluminum body, rough glowing balls in neatly milled recesses, an engraved logo on the beveled side. It's clear that it was designed to be not only functional, but also deliberately cool. It's pleasant to hold and easy to use.
In addition to the Mojo, you can purchase a variety of accessories. These include a set of cables for connecting the device to everything possible (only the cable for Apple devices is sold separately) and a variety of cases. Chord has tried to build its own ecosystem around the Mojo, releasing not only accessories but also functionality expansion modules such as Poly — and I think the company has succeeded.
The Mojo case snaps shut with a satisfying “click.”
The device is powered by its own battery, which lasts for 8-10 hours. To connect to a PC, the additional cable set includes a USB cable that splits into two MicroUSB cables — one for audio transmission and the other for charging. For my laptop, which has only one USB port, this cable was ideal. The power input hisses slightly, and the battery heats up significantly both when charging and when in use.
There are three audio inputs — in addition to MicroUSB, there is coaxial SPDIF and optical. There are two 3.5 mm jacks that support a line-out mode with a voltage of 2.9 V. In its default state, Mojo outputs 2 V.
Chord Mojo is a small gadget that sounds much bigger than its size. It doesn't just bring your headphones to life — it makes you listen to music differently, with greater interest and feeling. Its strong, clear bass delivery literally grabs you from the first notes, and the bright, lively soundstage makes even familiar tracks sound fresh. This is not a cold technical device — it evokes emotions, draws you in, makes you listen to old albums again and notice details that you missed before. Mojo is like a good record or a live performance: you want to come back to it again and again.
Emotion two
The combination of Mojo and a smartphone is too cumbersome for my lifestyle. In addition to the shovel, there is a quarter brick, which is not only heavy, but also thick and warm. The only pockets that can accommodate such a setup are in my fur coat, and a fur coat is only suitable for the cold weather, which lasts only three months a year — so, in general, they are not ideologically compatible. Of course, you can take headphones with a long cord, attach them to the Mojo, and throw the Mojo with your smartphone in your backpack, but then even changing the volume will become a quest, as will switching tracks. But for trips where both your smartphone and Mojo can be placed on a folding table or on the seat next to you, this design is quite suitable.
On top of everything else, the Mojo turned out to be finicky: it didn't like the MicroUSB connector on my two-year-old Moto X Force and kept crackling. With another smartphone, an old first-generation Moto X with a less worn-out connector, there was no crackling. However, I did not notice this behavior on other external DACs with the Moto X Force, so apparently Mojo is very demanding. Well, for the sake of the test, I had to dust off my old phone.
So, in my case, the portable use case for Mojo wasn't the main one: I turned it on more often at home, because a high-quality DAC never hurts a laptop.
Emotion number three
Windows and Mojo don't become friends right away. So, it seemed like I connected it to my laptop with Windows 10 and saw that Windows 10 was installing something on its own. It installed it and happily informed me in the sidebar that I was now friends with the Chord Mojo device. I was just as happy to plug my Phonon SMB-02 headphones into the Mojo, after turning down the volume, launch foobar2000, and click on the first track I came across. The track played with a terrible distorted ringing in my left ear, greeting my right ear with silence.
The strap, rubber bands in the upper right corner, and MicroUSB cables rolled into circles resemble an angry face.
This issue was resolved by installing drivers from the official Chord website, but I still managed to panic — what if I broke or burned something, and Phonon is no longer sold in Russia, and I only have one USB port on my laptop, and I feel sorry for Mojo… Moral of the story: you can never have too many firewood.
Emotion number four
There is a lot of bass. The Japanese Phonon SMB-02 headphones themselves are distinguished primarily by their bright, ringing treble; their character cannot be called bass-heavy. The headphones are on-ear, although they look large; the ear pads rustle at the slightest movement, but the design is comfortable, and you can easily sit with them on for a couple of hours — the sound, despite being bright, is still captivating and not annoying.
With Mojo, they got bass. No, not just bass, but Bass with a capital B. And it would be fine if there was just a lot of it, so much that it would drown out everything else, dominate other frequencies, and turn the sound into something like a VAZ classic with a “Dolbit normalno” sticker. No, Mojo plays like a well-trained, but lifestyle system. Incidentally, Yaroslav @YG also noted the non-frequency bloat in his comparative test of DACs.
Maxim @naumov talked about the bass-heavy trend a long time ago, and I also complained about the excessive bass in headphones, but Mojo, while delivering a lot of low frequencies, does it right. Cellos and double basses become plump, punchy, and get more reverberation, filling the composition with density. Along with the puffiness of the low-frequency range, its resolution also improves — you can hear not just a punchy beat, but the distinct knock of the stick and plastic.
This low-frequency delivery was preserved on all of my headphones and fit perfectly, for example, with calm, slightly oppressive electronic music, such as the track “Surgeon” by Infected Mushroom, where a measured, lazy, and enveloping rumble runs through the entire composition, over which other samples are already gathering. In stoner and trip hop, the delicately inflated bass also proved to be appropriate, adding tangibility to the melodies.
Two headphone outputs add splitter functionality to the Mojo 
No expense spared on screws 
All inputs are on one side, outputs on the other
But it's not just about the bass. Vocals with Mojo performed by Phonon became a little cleaner and livelier, and the ringing sound for which these headphones are famous subsided slightly: with this set, the provocative tinnitus at the beginning of Buckethead's “King James” sounded the safest. In some compositions, it was possible not only to make out the lyrics syllable by syllable, but also to hear the vocalist swallow before the next line. The tracks gained more air and volume, and the hysterical saxophones and brass instruments were given the space they needed. At the same time, the whole jumble of instruments did not descend into cacophonous noise, but remained organized, distinguishable, and controlled.
An interesting and opposite effect was observed with Infected Mushroom: some tracks became intimate and collected, as if all the huge speakers blaring samples, along with me and the guitarist with his combo, were crammed into a 3x3x3 m room. The familiar pseudo-technological crunch in the right channel in the track “Supermoon” by 65daysofstatic crept somewhere into the middle, and the squeak superimposed on the composition in the left channel also shifted closer to the center of the stage.
Mojo works its special magic with DSD. Both Hidden Orchestra and GoGo Penguin turned into very detailed, coherent, vivid stories in its performance. The PCM versions of the albums could not boast such clarity and precision.
And it should be noted that Mojo is also a very expensive headphone splitter. With it, two people can easily watch a movie on a laptop on a plane, and the battery should last for a flight from Moscow to Hong Kong. There is no lag when watching videos.
So, the Chord Mojo is a device that is difficult to evaluate based solely on its technical specifications. Its magic lies in how it presents music. It doesn't just make the sound louder or clearer. It adds weight, density, and, most importantly, emotional color.
This is especially noticeable in the low frequency range. The bass on the Mojo is not a blurred rumble, but a detailed, elastic, and incredibly convincing foundation. It does not drown out the other instruments, but gives the music power and solidity. It's that “bass bait” that makes you feel the music with your whole body.
Ultimately, Mojo creates not just high-quality sound, but a deep emotional connection. You stop analyzing the details and simply immerse yourself in the experience. With it, music becomes tangible, alive, and truly captivating.
This portable DAC amplifier is not for everyone. Its price and unique design may be off-putting. But for those who are looking not just for an “upgrade” but a new, more passionate way to listen to their collection, Mojo may be the device that changes music forever.
