Question about Gain, amp power and volume

my two hopes in being able to use the full range of my volume control is to be able to use the full amount (or at least half) to have fine control over the volume, also i get a jump in volume at certain parts in my usable range that does not correspond to the amount the knob is turned. i enjoy my dunlavys so i am just going to spend a little time to get the right lower powered amp and a cd player that will be compatible, once again thanks to everyone for the input, mike

All i will say is that you can't have "too much" power with Dunlavy's. I think that there are better ways to achieve what you desire, but i'm not you and we probably see things differently. Sean
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Mkaes, If you want to get a new amp, get one! BUT revisit the issues I raised regarding input sensitivity. Its not about the amount of power - I have three amps in my house I currently use, all are tubes (not that it makes a big difference) a 120 watt unit, an 80 watt unit, and 160 watt mono's. In that order they have input sensitivity of .65v, .95v, and 1.5v. The 160 watt units allow the most use of the volume control and I can get it up to about 12 o'clock using my BAT before its too loud. The 120 watt amp is too loud when the volume control is 10:00 (about a 9db difference). The 80 watt amp is too loud at 11 o'clock. As you can see from this example the amount of power the amp can put out has nothing to do with your problem. And, a final comment - you do not want to use all of the power available in you amp by rotating you volume control to the max - you will drive it into clipping which may not be good for your speakers health. As Sean sez, you can't have too much power, its just how you use it.

perhaps i shouldn't have put lower powered in my post as this shouldn't be a priority as muchas i should be concerned with finding an amp and cd combo that will work better with my speakers, if i can achieve this by just using a different cd player that would be great as this was the only piece i intended to upgrade in the near future, however if i understand correctly (and i may not have this right) i probably have a poorly matched cd player / amp combo for my speakers or just a poorly matched combo no matter what speakers (too much output from the cdp and low sensitivity inputs), once again i am set on the idea this is poorly matched as i have very little fine tune control over my volume level, of several systems i have had in the past i never has so little control, perhaps this is due to a cheap volume control but what is the point of a better volume control with 70 or more steps if you only normally use 15 to 25. That said if i get a cdp with a lower output level i may not have this problem but i really do not want to choose my source based my amp, i would prefer to limit my amp choices based on the cdp i choose, i'm sorry if i still am not getting this or if i am trying anyone's patience, but i think i've got it now, amp wattage not the issue, low input sensitivity on my amp and high output from my cdp is the likely cause, once again thanks for the break down

By having more steps in a control, you can obtain higher resolution. That is, rather than jumping up 2 or 3 dB's at a time, you can now step .5 or 1 dB at a time. This allows one to find the exact volume that they want. Only problem is, with that many steps, it is a REAL pain to obtain proper channel balance in terms of building the controls themselves. I have units with Mil-Spec potentiometers in them from the factory and even those don't track all that well ( channel to channel ). Can you imagine what it is like to have to sit and match resistors and then have to solder them to a million different steps on an attenuator??? Believe me, it is NOT fun.... Sean
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