CD with volume control/ no preamp.

I own a Theta Digital Miles and Magnepan 1.6qr's. The trade-off here is not is the image better and more coherrent with or without a preamp. You've found the same thing I have, It is Better! To me the question is, "Is it worth the gain in soundstage and detail, to loose the dynamics and warmth of the tubes in your preamp." I've always heard a distinctive loss in signal when I have to attenuate (sp?) the level out of the CD Player. It was the same for my older Dennon dc360, my marantz CE67SE. I like the CD player through a preamp at lower and moderate listening levels. When I choose to open up the system and let it run, I prefer straight through.

That's partially the Maggies, IMHO. They don't "come alive" at lower playback like an esl. Those have other problems, though. My CD50 has no trouble with dynamics at any volume (has beefy output devices). Using it balanced has increased the output by 6 dB, so that helps too. You could try balanced operation with the Miles, couldn't you?

Carl, I was very curious about balanced outputs into my NAD amp, but at the last moment opted for the preamp (a cj pv10) and a second par of interconnects. May be a design consideration, but the Theta bypasses the volume control at full open and that was another consideration. Does the 6db refer to the total increase in volume, or the increase in signal to noise ratio?

Dcs has come out with the Delius, a DAC with most of the performance of the Elgar. Apparently they are also touting it as a digital pre-amp, I believe without tone controls. If one uses CD only, that may be the ticket. David

As I've mentioned elsewhere, the new Boulder 1012 really does look like it might outperform the dCS gear (if it's even close to the claimed performance). TO PJPOLAND: The 6 dB is the overall level increase, but noise is helped quite a bit too, especially by lowering the interconnect's inherent noise. It's mostly a benefit from the common mode rejection of the circuitry itself (in the sending and receiving end), and has a tremendous effect on the noise content of the music while playing...and less of an effect (but still significant) of the "hiss" when music isn't playing (i.e., when you put yur ear right on the tweeter when nothing is playing, etc.).