Super-sensitive volume controls - remedy?

I understand what you're getting at, Atmasphere, but even back in the 70's and 80's I don't recall using any source that required turning the volume pot up much past 12:00 on any amp I ever owned. Of course, I have forgotten a lot of things about those days! Maybe direct from a tape head?

I may be missing some important electronic principle or oversimplifying things, but it seems that the maximum gain of a preamp could be lowered while using more of the volume pot to accommodate a wider range of output voltages from the various sources.

As far as I remember the Redbook standard has always been 2v.
Just look at the first players from Sony/Marantz/Philips.
EG: Sony CDP-101 Marantz CD-73 etc.
They all have 2v output spec, which is all that's needed to drive the majority of poweramps from yesteryear or today into clipping.

All this gain with preamps today, is a left over from the days of vinyl with low gain phono, step ups, and head amps, when you needed some extra gain.

Today digital sources, including phono stages have 2v and over output and that's all needed with a passive pre or unity gain buffer to send an amplifier into full clipping, so why the extra gain??

I keep coming back to Nelson Pass's statement below.

"We’ve got lots of gain in our electronics. More gain than some of us need or want. At least 10 db more.
Think of it this way: If you are running your volume control down around 9 o’clock, you are actually throwing away signal level so that a subsequent gain stage can make it back up.
Routinely DIYers opt to make themselves a “passive preamp” - just an input selector and a volume control.
What could be better? Hardly any noise or distortion added by these simple passive parts. No feedback, no worrying about what type of capacitors – just musical perfection.
And yet there are guys out there who don’t care for the result. “It sucks the life out of the music”, is a commonly heard refrain (really - I’m being serious here!). Maybe they are reacting psychologically to the need to turn the volume control up compared to an active preamp."


Cheers George

Thanks for pointing that out George. Funny thing though, we see 4 volts and more all the time, of course we get a lot of balanced line DACs and CDPs used with our stuff, which may explain the disparity.

Almarg - I bought the Rothwells to help achieve a more common volume control setting for CD to match with the Aria preamp's built-in phono stage. I tried the Rothwells on the preamp's CD input. This helped a lot to bring the CD closer to the phono's ideal listening level near the volume control's 12 o'clock setting but the result was disaster …. and out came the Rothwells.

Jafox, as I said above two posts back, they "can" be a negative.
What is the output impedance of the component before them? and the input impedance of the component after them?.
That way we can prove with math, it was a bad electrical impedance match.

Cheers George