Anyone Using A Lampizator Golden Gate (with volume control) Directly Into Your Power Amp?

[bazelio]

Well we can't have the source drive our speakers directly, but we can try to minimize what's in between in an attempt to maximize sound or, said another way, to minimize sins of omission and/or commission. ;-) .

PS - No need to give consideration to plebe fi products like Bricasti et. al. LOL

 

[astrotoy]

Off topic - but is your seller sending your GG to Poland for the free factory examination and report? That happened for my used GG I bought earlier this year. Lots of peace of mind after Lampi gave me a full report and clean bill of health, especially since I was buying the GG on ebay in a foreign country with a seller unknown to me. I didn't pay the seller until the inspection happened and Lampi shipped the unit directly to me. They also can do any upgrades you want (for a charge) but that is not required for the free inspection. BTW, my GG has a volume control also, but I haven't tried to use it directly into my amps. I don't have cables long enough to stretch to my monoblocks which sit right next to my speakers!

Larry

 

[KeithR]

That simply means you prefer the coloration of certain preamps. Nothing wrong with it, but it is a personal preference. They're masking or changing characteristics of your source to a greater degree. Many DACs "work" just fine without preamps though. EAR, Bricasti, PS Audio, Schiit, MSB just to name a few. Heck, even TotalDac claims to be able to drive anything above 100ohm directly without distortion and has 40 Ohm OI and something like 3.3 Vrms out. A perfect candidate for no active preamp. Whether or not you prefer the more transparent direct sound out of these DACs is merely subjective. Regarding the "maximize sound" objective, there are plenty of us who have empirically found the elimination of active components in the chain to do exactly that. It's just that your "maximum" might be my local minimum or thereabouts. As far as philosophy, yes, it stands to reason that everything we need is already in the grooves, 1s and 0s, or magnetic tape particles and preamps can't add musical content.

I don't think its quite that simple and almost all volume controls i've tried have a narrow soundstage and poor tone/timbre which to me is a coloration by a different name.

MSB is the only passive preamp with volume control in a dac that i've heard regularly exposes active preamps and most sell them. Particularly if they are digital-only.

 

[Sablon Audio]

Well we can't have the source drive our speakers directly

It is possible! I have a customer who drives his Voxativ speakers directly from the rca outputs of his Dave dac.

 

[bazelio]

I don't think its quite that simple and almost all volume controls i've tried have a narrow soundstage and poor tone/timbre which to me is a coloration by a different name.

MSB is the only passive preamp with volume control in a dac that i've heard regularly exposes active preamps and most sell them. Particularly if they are digital-only.

You're talking about integrated DAC volume controls? If so I'd agree that most are bad in various ways and should be bypassed in favor of a quality outboard attenuator.

 

[Highlander]

Off topic - but is your seller sending your GG to Poland for the free factory examination and report? That happened for my used GG I bought earlier this year. Lots of peace of mind after Lampi gave me a full report and clean bill of health, especially since I was buying the GG on ebay in a foreign country with a seller unknown to me. I didn't pay the seller until the inspection happened and Lampi shipped the unit directly to me. They also can do any upgrades you want (for a charge) but that is not required for the free inspection. BTW, my GG has a volume control also, but I haven't tried to use it directly into my amps. I don't have cables long enough to stretch to my monoblocks which sit right next to my speakers!

Larry

Larry, thanks for the suggestion. The DAC is actually on it's way to Poland from it's original owner and will indeed be checked out fully by Lampizator . It will also have a brand new 5 year warranty following completion of the testing.

 

[bonzo75]

Larry, thanks for the suggestion. The DAC is actually on it's way to Poland from it's original owner and will indeed be checked out fully by Lampizator . It will also have a brand new 5 year warranty following completion of the testing.

This is really excellent to provide health check up and warranty for used products.

 

[Charlie B.]

As I had to sell my Jeff Rowland preamp to afford the GG sym with volume, and then had to turn in the GG for the Pacific sym with volume I can´t comment on the preamp sound of either, but the preamp of the Pacific to me seems much more sophisticated and is definitely more fun to use.
Shakti reconed in a post that the quality of the GG preamp section equals standalone preamps up to maybe 7,000$...

 

[Sablon Audio]

Fwiw there have been upgrades to the Lampi attenuator stage over the past year or so.

 

[bazelio]

Fwiw there have been upgrades to the Lampi attenuator stage over the past year or so.

And?

 

[adamaley]

Anyone using the VC of a Lampizator DAC, specifically the Golden Gate, as a preamp? Can you provide impressions. Hopefully we can address the OPs question without sidetracking the thread on the merits of a preamp vs no preamp. I'm personally interested in answers to the OP's question.

 

[Golum]

Had a balanced gg with VC and ARC Ref6 standalone preamp. IMHO if you have a good preamp VC in GG is just not on par with this in any segment. So I kicked it out and took GG2 without VC...guess this speaks for itself...

 

[wisnon]

Anyone using the VC of a Lampizator DAC, specifically the Golden Gate, as a preamp? Can you provide impressions. Hopefully we can address the OPs question without sidetracking the thread on the merits of a preamp vs no preamp. I'm personally interested in answers to the OP's question.

IMHO, its more a debate about Active vs passive preamp here...

 

[Highlander]

Well, my Golden Gate arrived from Poland late Thursday night. It's early on, obviously, but initial listening sessions (including a somewhat extended one with audiophile friends) is seeming to indicate that, in my system, the sound is better using the Golden gate directly into the amplifier, bypassing my preamp, and utilizing the volume control and preamp facilities of the DAC.

And, honestly that disappoints me in ways I can't entirely explain. I really, really have liked my preamp, but when using the Golden Gate direct, with the supplied "high end" tubes from Lampizator (the KR PX4 tubes and Emission Labs 5U4G ) there is simply significantly greater clarity, balance, solidity of bass, and overall sound. When the preamp is inserted back into the system, the quality of bass and depth of bass suffered a real setback, and some other elements of the sound were a bit muddied. On Friday night, the opinion of the two friends I had over for the listening session was unanimously for the better option being using the Lampizator GG direct, and not by a small margin. I initially found myself trying to disagree but just could not overlook the overall quality of sound using it that way.

JC

 

[bonzo75]

Hi JC, your art audio Carissa, Which 845 are you issuing on them?

 

[Highlander]

Hi JC, your art audio Carissa, Which 845 are you issuing on them?

Oops, sorry, must not have updated my system info for a while, my apologies. The Carissa, wonderful as it was, is no longer with me. I left the SET path to go in a different direction. Current power amp is a Conrad Johnson Art SA, current speakers are Audio Physic Cardeas Plus +.

JC

 

[bonzo75]

Oops, sorry, must not have updated my system info for a while, my apologies. The Carissa, wonderful as it was, is no longer with me. I left the SET path to go in a different direction. Current power amp is a Conrad Johnson Art SA, current speakers are Audio Physic Cardeas Plus +.

JC

And what is your pre?

 

[Highlander]

Manley Neoclassic 300B RC, which, given its design and the combination of tubes has been the best of nearly fifteen preamps I've tried in my system prior to the Golden Gate. It includes the following tubes:

Matched pair Sofia Electric Royal Princess 300B Tubes $1200 original cost

Matched pair Sofia Electric 6sl7 Grade A Tubes $240 original cost

Ma5tched pair 5AR4 Amperex Holland from 1959 $320 original cost

Date Matched Pair NOS NIB RCA USA USN-CRC-84= 6Z4 Black Plate from 1960 $100.00 original cost

 

[Derekw14]

I owned a Golden Gate with VC, and it was the only DAC I had where driving the amplifier directly resulted in better sound. All the other DACs I had in such a configuration provided better transparency/see through, but music lacked body, flow and bloom. Not with the Lampizator Golden Gate. I also used it as a pure preamplifier, connecting my phono stage to its (analog) inputs, to excellent results (if with a touch of slight hum). The Golden Gate is a wonderful and incredibly versatile machine.

 

[bonzo75]

Well... The GG continues to be my favorite thing in this hobby, and I love it more with every trip I listen to it. I would have loved to sell it off and put that money into analog, but that's not happening.

That said...i am a fan of an external pre. Highlander, maybe you are not trying preamps of a sufficiently high quality. You have to go up the model chain of preamps like AR. My favorite combo of Lampi is with any preamp where it works with the 242. This happened with the Aries cerat preamp, and Christoph from the principality of Liechtenstein uses this combo as well... So you might want to audition that preamp to check if it works with the GG and 242 in your system. If it does, hifi will become boring as you won't need to change anything after that.

In solid state, the analog domain pre works well, and I love the Soulution preamp combined with valve power amps but haven't yet tried the Lampi with it. Will do.