Need some pre-amp advice...

Thanks for the feedback -- I was concerned about the Sonic Frontiers, that the manual is none too clear about how the ssp bypass actually works. Could you shed a little light on it for me? I know that they are available pretty regularly. It sure would be a nice break, to find something cheaper that does what I need!

Thanks for any and all information.

Blake

Yes, I have listed to a few of them. Not the Krell or the Levinson piece, as the Lev is too new, and the Krell, my dealer does not stock. I have heard the BAT, but it was hooked up to BAT 150SE, through Eidelon Diamonds, so no real comparison to what I have. I have heard the ARC, once again on a totally different system, though.

Blake

Rowland Synergy IIi is amazing and is a fully balanced design.

I used to run a Wadia 850 direct into a BAT VK60. This was 4 years ago when the 850 was near state of the art. I brought home a BAT VK50se at that time. Wow, an active preamp really improved things for me. Mostly in the area of soundstaging, bass control, robustness of sound.

The BAT also fits your xlr criteria above. Should drive the Pass amps fine (search here, other have posted w/ bat pre's and pass amps-everything seemed fine)

If someone didn't tell you about tubes in the BAT you'd never know it with out looking. About as carefree as it gets. I owned my VK50se for 3-4 years with out any trouble whatso ever. I recentley upgraded it to a 51se and replaced the tubes (plug and play took about 5 minutes total-if you can change a light bulb-you can do this) not sure the tubes did much, after 3 or 4 years the old tubes were just fine.

Your preamp list is all good. They will sound different. You may have to try a few. IMO, you'll be just fine with the BAT.

Blake,

I had your same dilemma. I was looking for a a two channel balanced preamp to run my Lexicon processor through. After searching and trying many tube devices and a Krell, I settled on the X0.2.
I have since separated the two channel audio from the seven channels of video related audio into two separate rooms. Now I do not need the bypass, so I have been auditioning preamps to see if any others meet my sonic needs any better than the X0.2. I have found none that do.

The X0.2 steps to bypass are still in my Pronto under the theater macro. I mention this because if you decide to go the bypass route, it is the easiest way to set up a "theater system on and bypass"macro to work from your theater chairs. Especially for the wife and kids. (My policy is the less family fingers touching gear the better. Prontos are cheap by comparison to the gear.)