Any advantage having a 3V Dac output?

Any advantage having a 3V Dac output? I understand that a 3V output would be an advantage if one is using a passive preamplifier

Correct, you don't need any more voltage gain from an active preamp,
And you only even need 2v from the source as most power amps only need 1v to1.5v to get full wattage output {clipping), 3v will blow their heads off.

Cheers George

I believe that 15 dB gain (which is low -- most amps have 20+ dB of gain) means that the amp needs about 2 1/2 volts input for full power output. He should be fine with the 3 volt output of his DAC.

That 6x gain translates into 15db, which is lower than many other amps but pretty standard for the first watt approach.  I don't know enough about voltage input sensitivity to know for sure, but I suspect that value is also lower than many other amps too.

@tiofelon diyaudio.com/passlabs is a good source for finding out more esoteric details regarding first watt offerings. In the below thread, they state:. "The F5 has a gain of 6times.The clipping voltage of the F5 is ~ 21Vpk, or 14.7Vac."

https://www.diyaudio.com/forums/pass-labs/218770-diy-f5-questions.html

Thank you all for your responses! My power amp is First watt F5 unfortunately the manual does not include the info regarding the input sensitivity!

Even with a passive pre 3V may not be needed,  it depends on the input sensitivity of the amplifier. With an active pre, 3V can often be too much. 

The answer to your question is system dependent -- what’s the input sensitivity of your power amp? If it only takes 1 or 1.5 volts for your amp to output its full power, then your 3 volt DAC output is largely wasted -- you’ll need to either turn down your analog volume control a lot or reduce the volume of the digital signal being fed to the DAC.

Keep in mind that once your amp is outputting its full power, anything beyond that is just clipping. Putting extra voltage into the amp’s inputs doesn’t increase the available max output. And, if your amp uses a traditional potentiometer to control volume, these pots often track most poorly at the lower levels (9 o’clock and under), meaning you could end up with more channel imbalance that you would have if the volume control is turned higher to achieve the desired volume. 

OTOH, if you have a power amp with a low sensitivity input, the 3 volt output will help you without needing additional gain from a preamp. 

I just got a MHDT Stockholm v2 DAC-3v.  I was using the DAC output on my Emotiva ERC-4 CDP at 2v.
Into my  Decware Mini Torii the MHDT produces more volume at the same volume settings when compared to the Emotiva.  With a 4 watt amp it makes a difference