@cat_doorman It sounds like we are roughly the same age based on your walkman story. I am also running all my music digitally, through my Marantz DAC and into a bottlehead tube preamp and then into Bob Latino VS-120, Zu Audio Omen DW speakers. I have been experimenting with different preamps, a lot, even though my amp has an attenuator / preamp section. I just don't find that I get the same "richness" out of my music without the additional preamp. I have also been swapping in different tubes, and that make an enormous difference (12ax7, 12au7, 12at7). I know you were more interested in gain, but I suggest strongly that you experiment with good tube preamps, if you like that sort of sound as much as I do. I was using, and just sold a Rogue Audio 66 preamp, and that thing sounded magical with my setup.
What am I missing? Pre/power gain and input sensitivity.
I’ve read a few posts about power amps with lower gain needing a pre with additional gain, but no one seems to mention input sensitivity in those conversations. If my source outputs 2V and my power amp input sensitivity is only 1.2V then whether the power amp gain is 16dB or 26dB my pre amp is attenuating the signal and the amount of gain on the pre doesn’t matter at all. With a given set of speakers, to get the same SPL with 2 different amps they should just need to output the same voltage, regardless of how they get there.
Am I missing something?
Am I missing something?