Tube Research Labs Latest Dude Preamp

Thanks for the update and your closing comments Charlie. I hope this works out for you, please keep us updated.

Glory, what was wrong with La45's post? As I said a number of times all the bickering and attacks on the customer from the TRL camp were not working in TRL's favor. I think there is a valuable lesson that should be learned here (once again as history has a way of repeating itself). Don't you? Paul really didn't have a choice in the end. He should have made the offer much sooner before things erupted, but in the end he came through and that is what matters.

BTW - very nice of you to apologize to Charlie. Indeed very good character shown on your part.

1) Depends on how a company implements a balanced design. Typically true differential balanced circuits resolve noise issues and allow one to use extremely long cables without degrading sound quality. If the balanced circuit supports the 600 ohm standard (and not all of them do) then you get the added benefit of eliminating interconnect cable artifacts. Meaning you should not be able to hear the difference between different types of interconnect cables. Think pro audio equipment. On the other hand whether in general it sounds better than single ended is up in the air. Lots of threads on this in the forums that discuss this. You might want to look up some posts by Atmasphere (Ralph Karsten) who has often chimes in on such subjects.

2) No, not really. It just means the Dude can handle a lot more output voltage which is a good thing for flexibility purposes. A higher output voltage on the source will add more overall gain to the system, perhaps leaving less flexibility over the volume control.

3) Not sure what you mean by this one. Usually output impedance of the preamp is a key spec in determining how well it works with an amp. There are other considerations as well, but your question is vague in this respect so can't say for sure.