I have had a fondness for Marantz equipment in the past---and had essentially lusted after the build quality and appearance of these newer components---And of course I do realize that one can get caught up in the "lust" factor.. and that should not be the primary reason . I almost bought one and was reconsidering yet again due to one coming up for sale currently. The following message is what I received from Jena Labs owner--- and can't remember her name at the moment.
"If you have a real balanced source in correct polarity and a real balanced power amp. the preamp in stock condition will simply pass the signal thru, regardless of the being in or out of absolute polarity.
The problem arises when you have a single ended RCA in, and want to use balanced XLR out. In stock condition, a POSITIVE going waveform on an RCA input will produce a NEGATIVE going output waveform on pin 2 of the XLR, which is an inversion.
The other problem is when using an XLR input, and single ended RCA output, where a positive going wave on Pin 2 input will result in a NEGATIVE going signal on the RCA center.
Moving, exchanging the position, of the wires on Pins 2 and 3 on both the input and the output XLRs corrects the problem.
There is also a problem with Marantz source equipment, SACD'CD players and DACs where a positive going digital command will create a negative going wave on Pin 2 of the XLR out, also an inversion. RCA is correct with a POSITIVE on the center pin.
If using RCA to RCA in the Marantz preamp, or from a Marantz digital source, the polarity is fine in stock form. It is ONLY the balanced XLR connections that are inverted.
Non of this is to be confused with the fact that some equipment will invert polarity, due to the nature of the circuits involved, and wanting to minimize complexity by not running yet another stage to re-invert the inverted signal, which would result in a non-inverted throughput. Single gain-stage tube pre-amps are typical examples of inverting components.
I do not recall the exact date the USA joined the world standard, but was long ago. In 1969 I met a sound engineer here in Portland Oregon that was still doing conversion work in theaters and arena sound systems, usually only when a component needed service or replacement and he was there performing other work. "
Apparently , I lost a part of the message as the owner of Jena Labs told me that she contacted Marantz about this but nothing came of it. They had no interest.
