Adding a pre amp

[Kimo]

On 2/12/2018 at 2:50 PM, mustafakaiser said:

Hello guys.

 

At the moment I have a PS Audio Direct stream DAC with a JEFF ROWLAND 625S2 power amp and use SOTM set of 3. I am thinking to add the PS audio BKH pre amp. 

 

Can anyone shed some light on this?  

Cheers

Obviously, your path to sonic nirvana is much clearer after asking this question and reading the replies, but I will add one more piece of wisdom.  I suggest demoing the BKH preamp in your own system, and you tell us how it sounds.  Shouldn't be too tough to find a demo out there.  Of course, no matter what you find, fully one half of the posters will tell you that you are wrong, but that is okay.  You will have heard it for yourself.

[Kimo]

37 minutes ago, Spacehound said:

There is a school of thought, of which I am a  member, that the more money you spend the more everything should sound the same. (Playing the  same  recording  of course )

 

You want what is possibly the best 'high fidelity' amp in the world? Try  the Cambridge Audio 851 power amp. It's only about 1,500 dollars. You probably won't like it, as it is totally 'characterless',  as a  good amp  should be. Play a different recording.

 

 

If almost every amp has a character, how do you know which one is characterless?  Your concept of character appears to be based on specs.  Nothing wrong with this approach, but loads will vary and character will follow, in some cases much more than others.

 

Your best shot at a characterless sound is going to come from active speakers.  I have heard a number of pro monitors and I certainly wouldn't say that they all sound alike, however. 

[Kimo]

2 minutes ago, Spacehound said:

Amps with 'character' impose it on everything they play.

This applies to everything, active speakers included.

 

If they don't sound alike some of them are 'broken'.  Maybe all of them are. A  true full specification  which is far more accurate than your own personal opinion ('red cars are better than blue ones') will tell you.  It's that easy. 

 

HiFi is simple engineering, not difficult, and well understood. No magic is involved. It's  just  a 'consumer durable', like a washing machine. 

Apparently, you missed every point I made, and they weren't that obtuse.  You only wish to spew the tenants of your audio orthodoxy, so there is no point in talking about this any further.  

[Kimo]

37 minutes ago, Spacehound said:

I didn't miss a  word/point as there weren't many of either  to miss.  I just don't believe in magic. Nor  the claims of small companies with  correspondingly  small resources.

 

I just buy stuff I take  a fancy too, same as everyone else.  I didn't take a fancy to the  Cambridge 851.

 

Will this do?

Lenovo tower PC, unmodified----->dCS Rossini---->no preamp----->Naim NAP250DR------>Tannoy Kensingtons.

 

And you did ask me, after all, Orthodox things are orthodox because they work, I don't want an untested flying saucer that is claimed to operate by magic, I want  a Boeing 747.

So, it really is a religion for you.  You preach one thing, but follow another.  You are still missing most of what I said, though.

 

You do get points for the Tannoys.  They really do some wonderful musical things to enhance listener fun.  Too bad the Germans are now dragging the company down to an ugly finish.

 

I must add that I bet your system would sound better with a matching Naim preamp...

[Kimo]

7 minutes ago, Spacehound said:

It would sound different but not have an improved sound quality. That's impossible for reasons  I have already stated. And with which Naim agree in their literature.  .

Are you a monumental simpleton? 

[Kimo]

12 minutes ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

Attack the argument not the person. 

He doesn't really have one.

 

And this becomes a problem, in that guys like him tend to be the type that chase away those from which many of us can actually learn something.  He should be posting on the Hoffman forum, or riding motorcycles with Sal.

[Kimo]

"His argument is real, simple and nearly unrefutable.  DACs are quite capable of sending a signal to a power amp with no help.  No pre-amp could be more than audibly transparent, in which case you'll not hear it.  If you hear it, the reason is it altered the signal in some way.  Which means it added some distortion or some coloration or changed frequency balance did something which is lesser fidelity." 

 

Adding buffers and gain stages can certainly improve sound quality, depending on a number of factors.  I believe that you mean well, but you are going over board.  By extension, any amplifying device with a single gain stage will surpass any other.  Do you really believe that?

 

The insertion of a high quality preamp may be preferable to relying on a poor volume control coupled with a weak or poorly designed power supply, even if transparency may suffer a bit.  S/N certainly will,  but so what.  There is more to it than that.  This has nothing to do with Golden Ears.  

[Kimo]

And while I am at, Spacehound's argument in question was that the Cambridge was the Holy Grail of neutrality.  My argument was that no such thing existed, and if you really want to try and come close, you better design amp and speaker together.  Oh, and that I haven't too many pro set ups sound all that much alike either.

 

But, I guess I summed up my position on preamps in the first reply, so that is that.  

[Kimo]

13 minutes ago, esldude said:

Well one could certainly conjure up a shitty modern DAC/Pre that might benefit from a preamp.  Those are not nearly so common as believed.  Why anyone uses anything other than digital volume control is a mystery.  No analog control of any design can compete. 

 

If your DAC has a weak or poorly designed power supply don't buy a preamp to buffer it.  Buy a better DAC.  Is this really so hard to understand?

 

As for single stage amplifying device of any kind being better, you are putting words in my mouth that don't belong.  So stop the straw man approach.  

Just listened to Benchmark DAC 3 playing into a couple of monoblocks with silly purported S/N ratio.  The designer of the monoblocks also makes his own preamp DAC.  Benchmark sounded better through that analog input than straight into the blocks.

 

By the way, calling something a "straw man" argument because it extends to your implications isn't really correct.  You basically stated that adding a gain stage between a DAC and amp would be a negative in almost every single case.  The implication being that adding a gain stage is only useful when it acts as band aid. 

 

Hence, the ultimate amplification device, by implication, would involve a single stage, no?  This assumes it is operating properly, of course.   

[Kimo]

1 hour ago, esldude said:

No because not all DACs that do a good job will have a single stage of amplification.  They may have opamps buffered by discrete circuits or opamps buffered by buffer opamps.  Or any number of configurations.  The idea is good DACs will have the necessary circuitry to drive the signal as good as can be done into the input of an amplifier.  So no active preamp needed.  It is redundant at best and possibly detrimental.  

I can't disagree with this, but I haven't necessary found it to be the case in practice.  I have found that the "simplest" amplifiers haven't always sounded the best, however.

[Kimo]

4 minutes ago, Spacehound said:

Good.  Now we can get back to high fidelity.

 

Which is what many of us pay for. Or don't, in the case of a preamp.

 

I bet you blew your wad on the DCS, so you can't afford one anyway. 

 

 

 

[Kimo]

1 minute ago, Spacehound said:

Did your "that is that" mean  two  more goes?

I am now starting to question your literacy, or at least your eyesight and/or sobriety.

 

 

 

 

[Kimo]

Just now, Spacehound said:

Question whatever you want. For example, I question the veracity of  the bible's talking snake.

 

BTW: I gave you an 'uptick' for your  "simpleton" as I can't prove I'm not one.

Well, your response to that one was rather good, so I can't take all the credit.

You might try reading what I actually said in this thread about preamps, though.

[Kimo]

5 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

people on here are sober??

Not for long.

[Kimo]

1 minute ago, Spacehound said:

My reading it is why I disagree with you. What's hard to understand?

 

BTW: It wasn't an apple, either  They don't have apple trees in the ME, it's too hot. More likely an olive. 

So, you fervently disagree with the recommendation to demo first.  Are you some kind of anti preamp Nazi?

 

It was a Citron.

[Kimo]

1 minute ago, Spacehound said:

I rarely bother to demo stuff. The Mercedes  I mentioned was purchased because the Mercedes dealer was the nearest.

 

Did citrons exist then?

You will have to ask the Pope.  I am not sure what name he uses here.  Apparently, it is one of the original citrus fruits, so there is a chance.

 

[Kimo]

5 minutes ago, Spacehound said:

What's a Pope?

A big fan of tube preamps.  

 

That was a gift to you, and a feeble effort to bring this thread back on point.  It has veered a bit.

[Kimo]

6 minutes ago, esldude said:

I've used all the combinations.  The best by far have been DACs with digital volume control directly feeding a power amp.  Not all DACs are built for this.  Those that are work just fine.  There is nothing an additional active analog preamp could contribute other than coloration or being so good it might as well not be there.  Tube pre's often have a sound of their own.  Many like it, but it isn't fidelity.  These days if you have a wimpy DAC that needs a pre, dump it, dump the pre, and get a better DAC.  

My dac doesn't even have a volume control, because, I believe, the designers think it would be a compromise.  There is a also tube at work for each channel.  Wimpy with no fidelity,  not sure what the guys at Aqua would think  Pretty sure they know their engineering, though.  

[Kimo]

2 hours ago, firedog said:

To make a long quote short, they like the coloration added by tubes. That's all they are saying. 

What color is that?  Have you heard this set up?

[Kimo]

4 hours ago, barrows said:

He is being modest, while he may not be John Curl, Paul is a very competent line level circuit designer, I used to work for him and have seen hime in process of designing low level circuits...

Did you leave because he wanted you to design a preamp?

[Kimo]

4 minutes ago, esldude said:

The depth and fullness are not in the recorded signal it is being added. 

 Huh?  How do add depth, other than by revealing more information?  How do you know what the proper dynamics are?  Fullness, maybe.

 

 

 

[Kimo]

Just now, barrows said:

It is impossible to reveal more information by adding an extra component to the playback chain.  Adding a preamp cannot increase actual resolution.  This is not an opinion it is a fact.

No, it is opinion.  Much is spewed about here as absolute, and of course all of it is just opinion.

 

I will give you this.  Provided the volume control and output stage of the DAC are of the same quality, or better than the preamp, and the DAC is capable of driving the amp correctly, there should be no reason to add a preamp.  Anything else, and you need to measure/listen.  

[Kimo]

14 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

 

Reminds me of the sampling rate thread. There are things we know without having to prove them empirically— mathematics and logic are like that.

 

There is nothing you can do to the signal to increase resolution if it’s not already present in the input signal. You can change the signal, interpolate, distort it, add to it other signals, but you can’t reproduce real details that are not already present. 

 

The only proper way way to do this is called deconvolution. It’s a mathematical way to undo distortions. I suggest that very, very few if any preamps do true deconvolution. It’s a really hard, if not impossible, thing to do well. Especially automatically. Now that would be a great product if someone could come up with it!

It would be an even greater product if we could use it on politicians.  

[Kimo]

3 minutes ago, esldude said:

So no one buffers the output of their DAC/pre?  Are you serious?  How many ways can someone misunderstand that a DAC analog output stage has the same job as a pre-amp analog output stage?

I am a pretty sure that this is well understood.  I am also pretty sure that the general argument would be that the quality of the buffer is different on a dedicated preamp.

 

My Gill Audio DAC included the the Gill Audio preamp board and bunch of expensive transformers.  That was DAC designed just like a preamp, but alas it had no volume control.

[Kimo]

14 minutes ago, esldude said:

So use a digital volume control in software.

The DAC is long gone.  Only did 24/96.

I ran it straight into an Art Audio Carissa, which had a built in volume control.  I wouldn't think of adding a preamp to that set up, but I did try one anyway.  It was pointless.

 

That being said, the Art Audio guy was more fond of running the Carissa with a preamp, so go figure.