TRL Dude or Joule 150 MKII for Major Pre Upgrade


Thinking of either of these for what I view as a huge pre upgrade in my system. Current system is:

-Celestion A3
-Krell KAV250a (500 wpc/4 ohms).
-Nohr CD-1
-Rotel 995 preamp

I am looking to pickup warmth, depth and much more soundstage. Quality bass is also important to me. I want to keep the Celestions and feel that my current pre is the weakest link. Will also will update my digital source and ss amp down the road.

My thinking is that it will be worth paying up a bit for a higher quality pre that I can grow into.

Also I have a small naive question...with either of these pre amps will the sound difference be that great compared to the Rotel.

Thanks...any comments are appreciated.

-Iggy
iggy7
So simple impedance of the source is partially ruled out- we are OK with a relatively high impedance at the input, so long as it is balanced. What happens if we use the same source to drive the RCA single-ended?

Grannyring, are you able to use the Jensen running single ended? How you would do that is to use the RCA input of the amplifier by using an adapter with the Jensens, one that ties pin 3 and pin 1 of its XLR output together.

This is still pointing to an issue with the input wiring where it is able to pick up noise from inside the amp. I suspect that it is common mode to the inverting input and so is not picked up when the amp is driven balanced.
Atmasphere, I have not tried to run the Jensen with rca's as yet. I am so thrilled with the sound right now. Seems my amp really sounds best through the xlr inputs. All I know is my system has never sounded better plus is now very quiet.