Why Single-Ended?


I’ve long wondered why some manufacturers design their components to be SE only. I work in the industry and know that "balanced" audio lines have been the pro standard (for grounding and noise reduction reasons) and home stereo units started out as single-ended designs.

One reason components are not balanced is due to cost, and it’s good to be able to get high quality sound at an affordable price.
But, with so many balanced HiFi components available these days, why have some companies not offered a fully-balanced amp or preamp in their product line?
I’m referring to fine companies such as Conrad Johnson, Consonance, Coincident, and Bob Carver’s tube amps. CJ builds amps that sell for $20-$39K, so their design is not driven by cost.

The reason I’m asking is because in a system you might have a couple of balanced sources, balanced preamp, and then the final stage might be a tube amp or monoblocks which have SE input. How much of the total signal is lost in this type of setup? IOW, are we missing out on sonic bliss by mixing balanced and unbalanced?

lowrider57
i have a balanced preamp and XLR inputs into my power amp, but the amp inputs are likely not balanced at all (Jolida 502p). Thus when I hooked up a pair of balanced Mogamis to replace whatever the unmarked weird green XLRs (that sound fine by the way) are that came with my preamp, the Mogamis sounded awful…

If the Mogami's are truly balanced and the Jolida shorts pins 1 and 3 of the XLR inputs, could this cause a change in sonics?

Yes! It brings the shield into play as part of the signal. IOW its not just for shielding any more. As soon as that happens, then the cable imposes considerably more artifact.
I have found most of the time that users go to XLR connections because they think they are "cool"... the fact is that RCA sounds better the majority of the time anyway.