Preamp - 18 dB Gain too low?

More on the Oppo's stereo only output, are you getting the siganl from the FL and FR outputs on the back to the Lightspeed?

Also taken from the manual are you setup it the programing for this way.
"4. Output Volume: Allows you to enable or disable the analog volume controls (also known as Variable
Audio). The available options are:
�� Variable – Enables the analog volume control. Use the VOL+/- buttons on the remote to
increase/decrease the analog audio output level (the maximum is 100).
�� Fixed – Disables the analog volume control. The VOL+/- buttons on the remote will no
longer affect the analog audio output, and the volume level is fixed to 100."

And then this also
"For the stereo outputs, if the audio system you are connecting to does not have surround speakers,
set the Down Mix option in the Setup Menu to Stereo. If the audio system has surround speakers
and Dolby Pro Logic or other surround audio decoding capabilities, set the down mix mode to “LT/RT”.
(For more information, refer to “Down Mix Mode” on page 68)."

Cheers George

Checked and corrected Oppo setting per suggestions, do not see any different on sound level. Volume --> fixed at 100%.

George raised an interesting concern - main voltage. The amp power outlet plug written "115 V, 50/60 Hz" seems OK for US AC electricity. I am wondering Shuguang started out design as for 230 V and made shortcut to convert to 115 V for North America market, compromised the amp voltage? I really don't know, just speculating. I did send my question to Grant Fidelity about the spect mismatch, but have not heard back from them yet.

You know what's completely screwy? I just checked the GF product page again, and they're recommending the matching S200MK preamp -- which is spec'd at a MAXIMUM output voltage of 3V. So you can't get full output power from these amps without 4V from your preamp, which the suggested S200MK can't supply. Madness!

I looked into their spec for preamp S200MK and also found a mismatch between in the manual and Grant Fidelity website.

Manual:
Output Voltage: more than 3V, maximum 10V
Output impedance: less than 10k ohm

Jeez, what a s**t fight this has turned out to be, most any active preamp is going to have trouble with this as you have found out with your Conrad Johnson PV-10AL and all passive preamps as well.
To make the input of a power amp 4v sensitivity is totaly wrong there has to be something else amiss somewhere either with the amount of output comming from the cdp or the amp it's self which needs to be changed to 1-2v sensitivity.
To boot I just saw you have 98db efficient speaker, if you had normal speaker 88-92db you would get nothing but a whisper comming out at full volume

Cheers George