Pardales, I ran my MC402 with a DAC straight in. Sounded good. I went ahead and went with a c2300 tube pre and liked the sound a bit better. The tubes added a nice tonality to the sound.
The main reason I went with the pre at the time was because the mc402 isn't that sensitive on input accepting up to 4v. My DAC (Transporter) put out 2.5v so I wanted to be able to use the full range of the MC402. It turned out the improvement in sound was a nice benefit but the extra voltage didn't make a noticeable difference.
Further I wanted the 12 v trigger, tone controls, and remote the pre offered. Frankly the MC402 isn't a real powerful sounding amp compared to some 400W amps I've heard. My 4 ohm 86 dB Aerials can take every thing the MC402 can throw at them. It is more than enough - I never listen to it all the way up but I could easily see a lot of people who want to, say, rock out or run a Symphony piece needing full power reserves. Of course the 402 is so smooth and warm, the spl can be very high without sounding so. BTW, it sounded great - smooth, warm, yet still detailed, even without the pre.
OTOH, I like the DAC into amp idea. Last week I bought a Cary 120s tube amp for a bedrooms system that I'm going to run a DAC into. I haven't received it yet so no report. I use my DACs exclusively without other inputs so a pre isn't a necessity.
The main reason I went with the pre at the time was because the mc402 isn't that sensitive on input accepting up to 4v. My DAC (Transporter) put out 2.5v so I wanted to be able to use the full range of the MC402. It turned out the improvement in sound was a nice benefit but the extra voltage didn't make a noticeable difference.
Further I wanted the 12 v trigger, tone controls, and remote the pre offered. Frankly the MC402 isn't a real powerful sounding amp compared to some 400W amps I've heard. My 4 ohm 86 dB Aerials can take every thing the MC402 can throw at them. It is more than enough - I never listen to it all the way up but I could easily see a lot of people who want to, say, rock out or run a Symphony piece needing full power reserves. Of course the 402 is so smooth and warm, the spl can be very high without sounding so. BTW, it sounded great - smooth, warm, yet still detailed, even without the pre.
OTOH, I like the DAC into amp idea. Last week I bought a Cary 120s tube amp for a bedrooms system that I'm going to run a DAC into. I haven't received it yet so no report. I use my DACs exclusively without other inputs so a pre isn't a necessity.