Hello.
I'm new to this forum bu I think I can help with this.
I'm a (very) happy owner of a Chord Qute EX and a long time user of XBMC on top of Linux (usually Ubuntu).
As soon as I got the QuteEX for evaluation at my home system, I've e-mailed Chord asking for a Linux driver and they promptly sent me this link, which has the driver for the QuteEX:
https://github.com/dubbycheong/snd-usb-asyncaudio/tree/ForChordEX
Apparently it only works with 32 bits kernels and kernel has to be version 3.13.x.x (at least, I've tried to compile it under 3.14 but it didn't work). Using that kernel compiling is just the usual make which will create a usb"something".ko and after you just have to insmod that file et voilá, you have the Chord in your linux machine.
As of now, I don't think DSD support is available in Linux, but all other formats are sent "bit-perfectly" to the DAC using XBMC as "a source": red light no top of the DAC for normal Red Book CDs; a kind of red meets green :-) for 16bits/48khz; a kind of red meets green meets something :-) for 24bits/88khz; green for 24/96; blue for 24/198 and a "kind of white" for 24/382 which is what Kodi (former XMBC) is sending to the DAC whenever I play .dsf or .dff files.
The sound is just amazing, life-like with great extension from top to bottom (as one would expect at this price range) but what led me to this choice was the hability to capture the "soul" of the performer, independent of the format being fed to him.
Just for the record, I've had an HRT MusicStreammer II, then an Ifi Micro I-DAC and the Chord was compared to an Ifi Micro DSD, but the sound from the Chord was much better than the Ifi gear, I had no choice but to keep it.
Hope I helped.
