Preamp - what's the purpose?
Intentionally dumb question...
I've heard various 5-15W tube amps in my room. EL84, 300B, etc. They all have input stages and the output stage. I send them a line-level signal from a DAC.
Sitting a few meters away from my loudspeakers, the first watt alone gives me roughly 80db of volume. I think these amps are biased to expect the line level signal directly. Why wouldn't the designer do that?
So what's the point of adding a pre-amp? Why do people do it?
thanks in advance
@mlsstl +1 It puts the magic and bloom into the sound. While direct DAC to amp components are getting better, except in rare instances a great preamp is requirement for really good compelling musical sound. Lots of folks have connected DACs directly to amps only later realizing got all the detail and dynamics of recordings but lost its soul. I am sure a few haven’t discovered this an don’t know what they are missing. |
