Is phase control switch a deal breaker for you?

I have a linestage that has a remotely controlled polarity switch (Levinson Ref. No. 32) and others that do not have such a switch. I like having the ability to make a switch for near instantaneous comparison, but, not having such ability is NOT a deal breaker for me.

I find that, with a lot of recordings, switching absolute polarity has mixed results, for example, the vocals may sound better one way, but the piano now sounds oddly phasey. One can be unduly distracted by trying to find the best position (this can change from track to track on a given recording). My current linestage does not offer this ability, so, I largely ignore the issue even though I know that there is a difference.

Wolf Garcia,

Ralph is Ralph Karsten, the founder and principle designer of Atmasphere electronics. His designs are fully balanced, so, phase reversal is accomplished just by using a switch. Single ended electronics would require an additional "active" amplification stage, and for that reason, there is much more of an issue of whether the sonic benefits of the ability to reverse polarity is worth the inevitable degradation from having another amplification stage.