Re amps with balanced inputs

I'm not highly experienced about this, but yes many amps are built with unbalanced topology using a balanced input line receiver or transformer & then driving the unbalanced amp. You do not get the full benefits of a fully balanced design unless all components in the signal path are full balanced from input to output, but you still have the benefit of balanced interconnect noise reduction / cancellation. Ayre Acoustics' amps are in fact full balanced & they are dead quiet. Don't all know about some of the others; McCormack's older DNA series amps are unbalanced internally.

The majority of amps and preamps only have balanced inputs/outputs, but not true balanced circuit topology. I
believe that Krell, Mark Levinson, BAT, Aragon, Jeff Rowland, Pass, possibly Simaudio, Classe, have true balanced
circuit topology in addition to balanced inputs. Most of the others just convert balanced inputs back to single-ended
circuitry. Preamps with single-ended circuitry use a phase
splitter to generate a balanced output. I have a rather limited grasp of electronics, so anybody in the peanut gallery, please feel free to correct me. Two good references
on balanced inputs/outputs are:

Stereophile Vol. 17, No. 11 (November 94)
94)
Stereophile Vol. 18, No. 12 (December 95)

Oops, I hit the wrong button.

Additional reference:

Stereophile Vol. 18 No. 12 (December 95)

Hope this helps.

Atma-Sphere is fully balanced.