Since I got way more clarity and the signal was kept very pure my passive had much much more bass and dynamics and sounds louder than my powered classe pre amp sounded. If your going to go with passive you need to have a good one. I recommend what I have, the reference line preeminence 1 series 2. It uses silver wire throughout. It's $1500 but I got mine for $400 used. Don't forget to put a ground wire on it either......Also matching gear is very important. My audio alchemy DAC and theta DAC sound very powerfull with my passive but I tried an EAD dac and I had to turn up the volume much louder and it still didn't have the pushing power of the other two. That's because the output volts was to low. It's like 2 volts but the manual shows you how to up that to 4 by clipping some circiuts, however it was on loan so I couldn't do that. And another reason some people wouldn't like passive is because they would be used to the colored sound of there active preamp which may gloss over flaws in the rest of there system. Passive lets you hear exacly what's going on with your stuff. So if something doesn't sound right then chances are it's something else in your system that needs to be changed out. Anyway you have to find a good combo so don't give up keep trying the improvments are well beyond worth the effort.
PASSIVE Preamp and LIFELESSNESS?
I have read alot of internet posts and opinions on Preamp and the prevailing train of thought for Passive Preamps is that they are very transparent, open, almost spooky in thier low noise floor, but that they suck out the life of music. I understand why an active may be better because they have the gain needed to drive long cable runs. But if your amplifier and preamplifier are close enough and have agreeing impedences and specifications then the passive would "seem" better than an active preamp. I am confused about the way a preamp is supposed to work in this particular situation, because I thought (not deeply, albeit)a Preamp passive or active was only supposed to pass the signal from input to output as "untouched" as possible? Having no preamp at all would be ideal, if you needed only one input. Wouldnt the Passive Preamp be the better of the two evils (active/passive)? I am asking specifically because I am at the crossroads of upgrading my system. I have a pair of Von Schweikert VR-4 originals and I need a new preamp, amplifier, and DAC to use with a Pioneer DV-414 transport. I would like to be as minimalist as possible which is why I am asking about passive preamps. Monolithic has a hybrid unit that is passive until you hit hit a certain point on the volume control and then the volume control becomes active. Cool, but no remote. Adcom has the unit that is leading my race right now with the the GFP-750, which has the best of both worlds, acitve and passive. I encourage any positive or critiqing comments on my system selection or concerning the topic at hand. The only thing I am concrete on it the speakers, I LOVE THEM, they are staying. Thanks for your time.