Thanks, everyone. Tried a few of y’all’s,recommendations and landed on @zlone Zlone’s advice. Got a good coax and did some A/B testing between the coax and the optical from the CXN into the C2700. The coax won hands down… much richer. Also tried RCA to give the Cambridge a fighting chance and converting the signal. It did not win, but it sounds great just imparting the digital signal. So, I set it to 100 and I’m keeping it for now. Thank you all for your input.
To Stream w/Optical Or Not
Looking for advice. I have a Cambridge CXN100. I recently picked up a McIntosh C2700 preamp. I am assuming the D2 DAC in the McIntosh is better than the CXN. If that is the case, should I just run the stream from the optical into the Mac. That being said, sound wise, does the CXN really add anything to the sound better than what a WiiM can do just as well (optically)? And if so, should I just sell the CXN and get a WiiM and pocket the rest? If streamers are used optically, how big a difference is there between a WiiM and a CXN? In full disclosure, here is my biggest problem with the CXN… to control the volume from the StreamMagic app or from Tidal or Spotify, you MUST use the preamp in the CXN. Why the hell would I use that preamp over the C2700?? (I have experimented using it with other amps, and it cuts the volume 40%… its preamp is not as good as the preamp in other integrated amps/preamps i own. So, I am pretty salty with this limitation of the CXN. It sounds great, but if I want to sit on my ass, the only way to control the volume in-app, I MUST use its built in preamp…. Dumb! Unless i am missing something. Thoughts?