How do I reduce gain on my preamp?

Mingles,
Your situation occurs far too often in a lot of companies. I have never liked this, and I truely do the same as AR did for me, for anyone calling on my business. It boils down to the corporate culture, and typically comes from the top down.
I get what I want out of life by helping others get what they want.

Very impressed with your results from AR. When I was looking for a new amp recently I was impressed with Bryston and Mcintosh, not only for the physical qualities of their products but for their practices. Bryston publishes the schematic for their amps on their web site. Mcintosh will sell you a full set of schematics and a parts list as a service manual for what amounts to little more than the cost of printing. I thus had a chance to study the schematics and make a more informed decision. I ended up with a Mcintosh but I also thought the Bryston amps were well designed and a nice quality product. It certainly says something for the company when they make the technical aspects of their equipment readily available. I prefer solid state equipment but if I ever decide to add a tube amp or preamp, your experience with AR will certainly give me a starting bias in favor of AR. There is no better advertisment. Glad I stopped to read this thread, one of the few times that I actually learned something of value from reading a thread.

Balance on my LS7 seems to be off, wonder if it can be adjusted easily .

Thanks,

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>08-09-09: Rhclam
Balance on my LS7 seems to be off, wonder if it can be adjusted easily .

One would assume that you've swapped interconnects to see if the imbalance stays in the same preamp channel? You changed speakers, and could have issues with them or their different polar response from your previous speakers interacting with acoustical asymmetries to shift the image.

Tubes might be something to look at. Gain varies between different tubes and even the two halves of a dual triode like a 12AX/AU/AT7. Usually not bad enough to be noticeable though.

Tracking between the two halves of a stereo potentiometer can be bad too.