Well, I can tell from experience feeding the CD player output directly into the amp does wonders for directness and transparency. That's my uber modded Oppo into an all tube class A Woo audio headphone amp.
What makes an amp sound more direct ?
In our hifi journey we have probably all heard amps with different topologies and implementation. Most of these amps would have an implementation which is a combination of one of these:
1. Single Ended
2. Push-pull
3. Balanced
4. Differentially Balanced
5. Class A, A/B, D
6. High/Low Damping factor
7. Zero Negative Feedback (global & local)
8. Low/Medium/High Negative feedback
9. 2/3/4/multiple gain stages
There will be more such items that can be added to the list. My curiosity arises from the fact that some amplifiers (or even preamplifiers) sound much more direct than others. The ones that does this trick generally seems to do the "they are here" trick very well. While the components which sound relatively indirect cast a sound scape which gives the perspective of "we are there".
Just from my observation, single ended and zero feedback designs sound much more direct than balanced designs especially ones with high negative feedback. Is this a coincidence or is there a valid reason behind this ?
1. Single Ended
2. Push-pull
3. Balanced
4. Differentially Balanced
5. Class A, A/B, D
6. High/Low Damping factor
7. Zero Negative Feedback (global & local)
8. Low/Medium/High Negative feedback
9. 2/3/4/multiple gain stages
There will be more such items that can be added to the list. My curiosity arises from the fact that some amplifiers (or even preamplifiers) sound much more direct than others. The ones that does this trick generally seems to do the "they are here" trick very well. While the components which sound relatively indirect cast a sound scape which gives the perspective of "we are there".
Just from my observation, single ended and zero feedback designs sound much more direct than balanced designs especially ones with high negative feedback. Is this a coincidence or is there a valid reason behind this ?