Posted by Albertporter on April 14, 2003 at 16:13:59:
In Reply to: Good god.... posted by Joe S on April 14, 2003 at 13:37:46:
I can play CD fairly loud, but the entire presentation seems thin compared to what I prefer. I don't know if that's due to my tepid acceptance of digital or the dramatic gain difference between my analog and digital sources. Part of this is the Wolcott Presence requiring twice the input voltage of some amps to reach maximum power and the Aesthetix Callisto is not a ultra high gain preamp.
Then you read posts were people are driving their amps directly with CD players, or through a passive preamp which offers no additional gain. I wonder if anyone else has issues with Wolcotts and low to moderate output digital?
I recently auditioned the Shanling CD player. I ran directly out from, first the tube then transistor output jacks controlling gain with the built in volume control. I wanted to try this due to the number of people claiming great performance benefit from this direct connection, avoiding the preamp circuitry. In my case the total output maxed out around 80 DB, producing strained bandwidth and a compressed soundstage. This with the volume rolled up to maximum. Results were the same on both sets of output jacks and with the original tubes replaced with NOS Western Electric (thanks Andy Bauman).
With my player, the Lindemann D-680 or the Shanling, the Aesthetix Callisto is often pressed beyond the 1:30 mark. Sometime near the 3:00 mark, depending on the CD's. On the other hand, I can get punishing SPL around 10:30 with my analog rig, due to the ultra high gain Aesthetix Io phono.
Although the Wolcott is not true balanced, wonder what benefit could be had by running them via the Aesthetix balanced output? I would welcome any input on this, as I am sure would Joe.
I just spoke to Soundlab about this and I have a call into Wolcott. If I get any information worth sharing, I will post.