2. amps-preamps
  3. 128510-2280

Why Single-Ended?

I’ve long wondered why some manufacturers design their components to be SE only. I work in the industry and know that "balanced" audio lines have been the pro standard (for grounding and noise reduction reasons) and home stereo units started out as single-ended designs.

One reason components are not balanced is due to cost, and it’s good to be able to get high quality sound at an affordable price.
But, with so many balanced HiFi components available these days, why have some companies not offered a fully-balanced amp or preamp in their product line?
I’m referring to fine companies such as Conrad Johnson, Consonance, Coincident, and Bob Carver’s tube amps. CJ builds amps that sell for $20-$39K, so their design is not driven by cost.

The reason I’m asking is because in a system you might have a couple of balanced sources, balanced preamp, and then the final stage might be a tube amp or monoblocks which have SE input. How much of the total signal is lost in this type of setup? IOW, are we missing out on sonic bliss by mixing balanced and unbalanced?

lowrider57

Showing 1 response by perazzi28

perazzi28's avatar
perazzi28
242 posts
 
Home audio, especially 2 channel systems with analog being the primary source will rarely benefit from balanced connections. Adding balanced operation in this scenario will only add more circuitry with no real benefit and likely have deleterious effects.  One should attempt to have a full-featured preamplifier that includes a well designed phono stage. This approach has significant advantages. The installation is much simpler, the cabling requirements are simpler as this approach has a concentrated purpose. Avoiding ground loops is generally not a problem with this approach and cable lengths can be kept to a very reasonable length. Plus the number of cables is minimized.
Balanced topology imposes twice the circuitry into the signal path.  Abandoning single-ended connectivity is not an advancement.


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