This thread is unnecessarily long: assuming no highly unusual impedance miss match there is no conceivable reason for a separate preamp in a digital reproduction chain: additional cabling and circuits for no gain (pardon the pun) How true, but it’s like talking to the deaf, but there are those that feel the need to color their sound with an expensive bandaid fix by adding a preamp with their added coloration/distortions, because there’s something else they don’t like in their systems when it goes direct from source to poweramp with no preamp. They may as well buy a 4 way tone control like the Schiit Loki. https://www.schiit.com/products/lokiCheers George |
Mr. Pass apparently believes there is sometimes a need for a preamp
Yes, and I've also said this, as I said in my second last post when the impedances are mismatched, but I also said 99% of the time this is not an issue.
I doubt he would manufacture the $17,500 XP-32 three-chassis reference preamp if he didn't believe it added something
It can only add coloration/distortion to the sound of the source, I ask you why not hear what the sound of the source is by going direct, then if you don't like it, don't spend $17k to color/distort it. Change it for a better source. Quote: Ivor Tifenbrun (Linn LP12) "It all starts at the source get that right and the rest is going to follow" And I'll add to that get it wrong, and you chase your tail looking for the right preamp to color the problem, as they all sound different.
I have no interest in a technical debate
Say no more |
Glad to hear Pass agrees with me. Now if I could only afford any of his equipment.... Yes well he is a "business man", and does make preamps, there’s money to be made there also, that’s just what you pay for knowledge and you’ve got to say if your a "glitz queen" they do look the part. I preferred his older Threshold poweramp circuit designs, when he used bi-polar output devices. Mosfets are good if you only use N channel top and bottom (but he doesn’t and it’s difficult), because then both top and bottom N Mosfets can give current, but the problem is the P channel doesn’t it’s always weaker, so a conventional push/pull complimentary l N and P channel Mosfet amp can’t give the current into low impedances like a NPN/PNP bi-polar can. Cheers George |
There are reasons many like what they hear through a preamp (or a unity gain buffer) better than through no preamp or through a passive. Let’s hear your technical reasons Mitch on this. If you quote someone you need to put before it Quote:Nelson Pass you still have quite a few minutes to correct your post. And you don’t understand, today there is 99% of the time NO impedance issues, unless you have one of those stupid power amps that are 10kohm or less input impedance, then not even tube preamps will drive them no matter how expensive they are. Cheers George |
Consider ignoring the "If You can’t Measure it"..."Only Trust Blind Testing" posts and LISTEN.... That’s just it you can measure it, and hear it. Going direct is even better again than the quote below by Nelson Pass, as there’s one less set of interconnects and a volume pot in the signal path, when going direct. Nelson Pass:
“We’ve got lots of gain in our electronics. More gain than some of us
need or want. At least 10 db more.
Think of it this way: If you are running your volume control down around
9 o’clock, you are actually throwing away signal level so that a
subsequent gain stage can make it back up.
Routinely DIYers opt to make themselves a “passive preamp” - just an
input selector and a volume control.
What could be better? Hardly any noise or distortion added by these
simple passive parts. No feedback, no worrying about what type of capacitors –
just musical perfection.
And yet there are guys out there who don’t care
for the result. “It sucks the life out of the music”, is a commonly
heard refrain (really - I’m being serious here!). Maybe they are reacting
psychologically to the need to turn the volume control up compared to an active
preamp.”
Cheers George |
Not going to dig out the references Yes they have their following, but not among "vast majority of professional reviewers". Cheers George |
Just asked for the link/s to "your claim" that
that the vast majority of professional reviewers regard (the Lams) as among the very best sounding amplifiers on the planet.
That's all. Cheers George |
Lamm ML2.2 SETs; a unit that the vast majority of professional reviewers regard as among the very best sounding amplifiers on the planet. And that very debatable also, I heard the Lam’s driving the very easy load of Genesis 5.3 mids and tops only, (as the have active bottom end) and an old stereo Classe DR25 made the Lam’s sound lazy with less transparency and detail. Cheers George |
But, there aren’t many folks (in a blindfolded test) who’d take a 0.001THD amp over, say, a Lamm SET With much higher THD numbers. Where if you can post the link, was this blind test and with how many conducted and printed up? Cheers George |
Ah the "great preamp vs no preamp" question.
So how can anything be better than zero distortion? Its tough, but possible in one of three ways.
1. It adds a euphonic distortion that you like.. nothing wrong with this, its what a Piano’s sounding board does. But why turn it into something else again with more colorations, it’s not what the maker of that piano specifically wanted you to hear. "Otherwise he may of added a tube sound board🤦♂️" and then called it a synthesizer instead of a piano.😏 Cheers George |
@georgehifi, could this be harmonics ... ??? ... "color it" Yes maybe more like the "harmonic distortions" from the tubes themselves, which some like😏 Like I said before, they can’t make what’s coming out of the source better (add additional music content that’s not there), they can just color it with distortions and or microphonics. Sources today have enough output to drive any poweramps to full power and more, this is why Nelson Pass said this. “We’ve got lots of gain in our electronics. More gain than some of us need or want. At least 10 db more. Think of it this way: If you are running your volume control down around 9 o’clock, you are actually throwing away signal level so that a subsequent gain stage can make it back up. Routinely DIYers opt to make themselves a “passive preamp” - just an input selector and a volume control. What could be better? Hardly any noise or distortion added by these simple passive parts. No feedback, no worrying about what type of capacitors – just musical perfection. And yet there are guys out there who don’t care for the result. “It sucks the life out of the music”, is a commonly heard refrain (really - I’m being serious here!). Maybe they are reacting psychologically to the need to turn the volume control up compared to an active preamp.”
Cheers George |
The music had structure and substance I never heard. You probably heard tube microphonics/euphonics. If you put that same source "direct" into a pair of very expensive headphones you will get the sound more similar to the passive pre than the tube. A tube cannot make music it can only amplify and in this case "color it" Cheers George |
In a blind test no preamp can improve upon no preamp.
That one needs to be etched in stone, as another great audio saying. Just like "it all starts at the source, get that right and your almost there" (Ivor Tiefenbrun Linn Sondek) Cheers George |
There isn't a preamp that's built into a dac that's even close to a good high-end preamp.
That's because they're far more transparent and dynamic, because there is no preamp, and all the volume controlling is done in the digital domain, just have to watch out for "bit stripping" using it at or above 75%. Cheers George |
