ARC amplifier with Conrad Johnson Preamp

@welcher the defined bass is might be a concern. Since the ref75se is great overall I feel like it’s bass control isn’t the “best” , don’t get me wrong it’s nice but it’s quite big and not as tight , I remembering hearing the ref75se into some Ayre , while the Ayre was controlling everything in amazing and perfect way and was super tight the ref75 didn’t , tho the75se played my soul.

anyway I didn’t understand from you .. would you pick the 17 second or would you pick it over the 14?

@cellorover TYVM for this information, I haven’t heard anything yet but no clue why I feel like I’m drown towards the 14 , price wise also a factor. Also I can upgrade it (at my country) or even send it to CJ and still end cheaper than the ref3.

I would really like to know what more people about think about the RCA to XLR from your personal view, and which way would you convert it 

I have a PrimaLuna 400 preamp and a CJ Premier 11 amp. Sounds fantastic 

Using the Cardas adaptors will not do anything to the sound. You can always change amps in the future. But the second part of your post has not been answered.

By shelf speakers, I assume you mean monitors. What is your budget and music preference?

@cellorover thats really good to know. My only concern is how it will impact the input impedance?

basically I’m looking for monitors , I listen almost to all type of music so really mixed genres overall. I thought about some Sonus Faber monitors or Proacs. Badger is around 3k.

Im trying to settle on a preamp between the :

CJ premier 14 , BAT 31SE , ARC Ref3

@cleeds i guess you are probably right about matching a balanced pre.

the ref 5 non se version is far away from my budget, and even the ref3 is stretching me in a way that I’ll have really small budget for speakers . 

the only balanced pre I can think of rn which entering is BAT vk31 se