My understanding is that at that price point, the Onkyo is not a true balanced design. As another example, my current Anthem is not either--even though it has balanced connectors.
The only truly "balanced" unit I've had was a Proceed PAV years ago. If your runs are short, the conventional wisdom is that you won't notice a difference. You will notice an audible difference more in the build quality of the product than you will with balanced vs. unbalanced assuming you don't have long runs and noise pickup. To my point, there are many, many very high end preamps and amp units without balanced inputs. You will also certainly notice more of a difference with good roomEQ. What the Anthem AVM50v does in my room is very noticeable and the more transparent the speakers, the more you will notice the effects.
I can't say that I've personally noticed the difference with a truly balanced system vs. one that simply has balanced/XLR connectors.
Glean what you will from the posts. Sometimes looking at minutia can be maddening and sometimes it helps to look at the forest instead of the tree to get perspective. Perspective always helps.
Thanks,
Theo
The only truly "balanced" unit I've had was a Proceed PAV years ago. If your runs are short, the conventional wisdom is that you won't notice a difference. You will notice an audible difference more in the build quality of the product than you will with balanced vs. unbalanced assuming you don't have long runs and noise pickup. To my point, there are many, many very high end preamps and amp units without balanced inputs. You will also certainly notice more of a difference with good roomEQ. What the Anthem AVM50v does in my room is very noticeable and the more transparent the speakers, the more you will notice the effects.
I can't say that I've personally noticed the difference with a truly balanced system vs. one that simply has balanced/XLR connectors.
Glean what you will from the posts. Sometimes looking at minutia can be maddening and sometimes it helps to look at the forest instead of the tree to get perspective. Perspective always helps.
Thanks,
Theo