2. amps-preamps
  3. 181242-145450

Okay to use RCA adapter on a fully balanced amp?

Not a XLR is better or RCA is better question BUT if I have an amp (Digital Amplifier Co) that is fully balanced and only has XLR inputs, if you use a converter and go RCA from a Preamp, are you losing out in quality?

 

Here is something from audioholics and their review of one of their amps - 

"The MEGAschino is a true fully balanced differential amplifier from input to output. It is essentially two  amps for each channel, and one amp per phase. This means it really should be used in a fully balanced system.The manufacturer supplies an XLR to RCA adapter, but these should not be used. If a balanced connection cannot be used, note that the amp cannot be driven to full power from a 2-volt single-ended output, the limit of most receivers."

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Showing 3 responses by orchardaudio

orchardaudio's avatar
orchardaudio
126 posts
 

My amps are fully balanced and there is no issue with using them with RCA to XLR adapter. 

The adapter grounds one of the differential inputs to ground and then the amplifier behaves like a single-ended to the differential converter.

The gain of the amplifier does not change and it requires 5V input to get it to full power. This is an issue with standard RCA 2V outputs as 2V will get you less than 1/4 of the amps rated output power.

This is why I recommended to most my customers to get my active RCA to XLR converter that @evank refers to above. With 8dB of gain, it takes 2V up to 5V.  

orchardaudio's avatar
orchardaudio
126 posts
 

@atmasphere I agree in this scenario, the input impedance on my amps using an RCA to XLR adapter would be 22k.

orchardaudio's avatar
orchardaudio
126 posts
 

@mulveling please note I was specifically talking about my amps, the original post is about amps from a different company and I cannot speak to those.

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