Interesting... It says in the manual for the Aleph 5:
"For the lowest possible operating noise in any environment, the amplifier is equipped with balanced inputs featuring a common mode noise rejection of greater than 60 dB. Balanced operation is accomplished through a passive network tied directly into the input stage of the amplifier, not with additional active input circuitry as in other products. This assures that the noise benefits of balanced operation are not accompanied by the degradation of more semiconductors in the gain path.
The input of the amplifier is flexible and can also be operated with unbalanced sources. The input system will exhibit full common mode noise rejection with passive balanced sources, where the negative input is connected to ground at the source through the appropriate source impedance. This allows adaptation of unbalanced sources to balanced operation with passive cable connections in a manner that achieves the noise rejection of active balanced sources. Pin 1 of the XLR input connector is ground, pin 2 is the positive input, and pin 3 is the negative input."
And in the beginning: "The Aleph 5 integrates power Mosfet devices and pure single ended Class A operation in a simple two-gain-stage topology"
Okay - so that means the basic topology is single ended and there is a passive network to direct balanced signal to the single ended amplification pathway? Well, there is no reason to convert to balanced if the amp is just going to turn the signal back into single ended and amplify it there - I have no hum when running under RCA. I was under the impression it was a balanced through-and-through amp. Do I understand this right?
