Running a CD player directly into power amps,

I see no problem with doing such so long as the input impedance of the amp is at least equal to or higher than the output impedance of the CD player. In other words, the CD player might have a 50 ohm output. The input impedance of the amp should be AT LEAST equal to 50 ohms and preferably much higher. If you were to use an amp with a lower impedance than the CD, sonics might be severely compromised along with circuit stability. Something else to take into account is that the less variance between the two figures might contribute to showing bigger sonic variances between the interconnects used. Sean
>

PS....The above numbers are stictly "gibberish" and were used for explanation purposes only.

If you buy either a new Resolution Audio CD55 or better yet a used CD50 you will never go back to a pre amp. I run my 50 direct to my Lamm 1.1's. I have tried many different combos of high end CD players and pre amps. I'd have to spend $20K to even get close to what the Res does and it still does not do it better. Removing the pre and an extra set of interconnects from the signal path just makes a huge difference. The Resolution Audio is nice because it has a true analog dedicated pre amp in the player.

You might or might not blow your speaker drivers depending on how powerful your amplifier is or depending on the output voltage of your CD-player. If your player produces no more than 1.5Volt in output than you'll probably have a loud but still listenable sound out of your speakers. It is a good practice to experiment with passive preamplifiers that attenuate a signal and give you an option to match output impedance of preamp with input impedance of power amp. The ideal case will be the infinite input impedance of power amplifier and zero output impedance of preamp. Things aren't ideal in this world so if your power amp has >=50kOhm input impedance, than you're OK with passive preamplifier which isn't realy amplifier since it doesn't have any gain. If you have a tube amp it'll work out great.

I assume that your cd player has a variable output so that you can control volume. The sound will depend on the quality of the volume control of your cd player, length of cables it needs to drive and whether it's output is powerful enough to drive your power amp. It can work but in most situations a preamp of some sort will sound better.

Most modern CD players can run straight into an amp with no problem. However, the lack of volume control is often a real inconvenience. Some CD players have built in volumes to solve this very problem (a passive attenuator is another possible solution).