Intergrated or Separates

[DaveC]

HI!

After building a tube preamp and amp I can appreciate the reasoning behind separates more... it is more difficult and IMO undesireable to have the signal switching and attenuation done in the same box as the amp. To equal the performance of separates, an integrated would have to have separate power supplies for the "pre" and the "amp" anyway, which I'd guess is rarely done. In order for a 2 stage tube amp to have enough gain, the designer needs to make too many compromises IMO, with an active preamp the choice of driver tubes and other design choices can be more flexible and closer to ideal.

I suppose you can break down the amplification down into as many boxes as you want. Dual mono pres + amps = 4 boxes, if all these had separate power supply now you have your amplification in 8 separate chassis... Personally I think a single pre + amp makes the most sense but I can see a dual mono preamp in one chassis and monoblock amps in separate chassis so they can be placed right next to the speaker they are driving.

[richidoo]

Welcome to AudioNervosa Dave! You are most welcome here.

I enjoyed seeing your new Aikido preamp project on AC, and your SimpleSE. We have a mutual friend, Mike Luckow, who you encouraged to build SimpleSE for his Feastrex speakers a few years ago. He spoke very highly of you then.  I built those little pine boxes for him.

Your points about separate stages is well taken. Another AN member 'steve' (Steve Sammet of SAS Audio Labs) used to write here about similar ideas. One being the importance of separate power supplies, and how signal can pass through power supply to contaminate the other channel. He also believed that voltage gain (preamp) should be separate from current gain (power amp) for the reasons you mention, they each do their own job best, and doing both jobs costs too many compromises.   Check out his posts going back a few years, some of them are real gems.

For compatibility reasons companies don't do this, because they want to be compatible with other brands' equipment. A 40dB preamp would not be happy with a (typical) 26dB power amp. And a 0dB voltage gain power amp would not be happy with a (typical) 20dB preamp.

I'm looking forward to reading how you like the Aikido/SimpleSE combination, and seeing you post often here in the future.
Rich

[DaveC]

Thanks Rich!

I almost bought Steve's 7A preamp board, but he decided to stop offering it.

I agree there's a lot of compromise in power supply, most integrated amps probably use the same PS for all stages and both channels, which isn't ideal. I would like to build a dual mono pre and amp someday... but the parts will cost a small fortune if I expect them to be a significant improvement over my current system.

So far the Aikido is sounding great, if my old preamp wasn't damaged (Anthem Pre-1 w/separate PS) I'd like to be able to compare them. I also made some significant upgrades to my SET amp while I was building the Aikido, which overshadow differences in the preamp. I would say the Aikido is mostly neutral, but has some warmth... I used AB carbon comp gridstoppers, Amtrans carbon film cathode resistors, and copper foil output caps to get a bit of warmth out of it.

[MrAcoustat]

Integrated  or seperates there is good and bad in both it all comes down to $$$$$ most of the time you get what you pay for my Chord integrated amplifier is the cheapest amplifier built by Chord but to me it aint cheap.