The future of preamps

Grannyring,
That was probably the most logically expressed post on this often repeated topic as I've ever read. You sum it up accurately as well as beautifully. Folks, go with what sounds best to you.

I didn't know you had experienced the Light speed on three separate occasions. You certainty believe in thorough scrutiny and a fair shake.
Charles,

Almarg said quote- "The 32 volts could be 1000 volts and you still would not have a problem". Yes I would!, I do not want a volume control to fully drive my amp on a clock value starting at 6am going to 3pm being the preamps full out-put, and making my amp fully driven at 8am!!!, That is not what I want to do!

Audiolabyrinth, it sounds from this post that you do not understand the difference between output capability and gain.

The two are different. In this case, the MP-1 can make about 32 volts. But it needs a lot of input to do that, as it does not have all that much gain and no source I can think of has that sort of output. Normally, it would be making much much less than that, not even a volt most of the time (signal and volume control dependent).

So output level is what it can achieve, gain is how much signal it will need to get there. A lot of gain, not much signal, not much gain and it will need a lot of input.

In your case, it would work out great as your amps have low gain also. Essentially, it would be impossible to cause the preamp to distort on your system. In fact its distortion would be so low that it would be very difficult to measure. Its that latter aspect which is why you want the high output ability- the more it has, the less distortion it is going to make when driving an amplifier.

Audiolabyrinth: An amp that is 3.58v to get it to give full output, is very unusual. Most amps are around 1.5v-2v in to get full output. In this case it could be likely you may need an active preamp.
I would still do the "Bolero Test" as it still comes down to if your source can give the amp enough volts to get to a decent loud level on whatever speaker you have, and if they are efficient enough you still may not need an active preamp.

Cheers George

Arthur is a man with opinions like all of us. It is strange all of the products he says are the best of the best are Coincident. Is this just a coincidence for Coincident? Highly unlikely in all honesty folks. At the minimum, it simply reflects his sole experience and preferences. At minimum.

With the WWW, anybody can be a professional reviewer so caveat emptor. People will naturally gravitate to reviewers that prefer their products for purchase decision reinforcement and info.

@ Grannyring, Hi, It is my opinion, that to fully realize a source direct to amp, you have to match the source out-put volts to the amps in-put volts to get all of the desired sound and power from the amp, this is an aspect, many audiophiles do not achieve!