Best preamp is no preamp: always true?


There seems to be a school of thought that between two well-designed (read no major flaws) CDP and AMP, the best PREAMP is NO PREAMP at all (let's assume that the AMP has a sort of minimalist volume control).

Is this a solid and robust statement? What would be situations where this is not true (still no major design flaws)?
newerphile1cf0

Showing 2 responses by gmood1

I've tried it in the past and it's not bad. But the preamp/buffer stage makes it a whole lot better IMHO. It never sounded slow or fat. Just slightly hard on cymbals and such. It's like having too much of a good thing that wears on you over time.
Yes I have. I've tried this with my passive integrated. It sounds much better when you have the active gain stage involved.Without it the sound is clear and precise but a tad thin without the help from a tube linestage. After trying it both ways I couldn't see going without the active linestage/ gain-stage in the loop. I liked the sound so much I'm getting a unit built without the volume control that is nothing more than a low gain active stage to go between my DAC and Integrated.