I was a bit surprised that a preamp maker told me to use balanced out (volume controlled) rather than line out, for recording. In the old days it was always "use line out". I recorded many vinyl drops on my trusty old Revox A77, and the line out was the way to go. Are there others, recording from vinyl, who have experiences in this regard?
The purist philosophy has been formulated as 'straight wire with gain'. My experiences point to the fact that the right combination of gain stages is a key for this 'with gain' part to work.. For example, having a Riaa with volume controls, I can tune it optimally as a source for my preamp. My preamp volume takes over, from there. Much like getting the right juices flowing, or mixing a sauce right. One might think, introducing one more gain stage is bad, but sometimes, it is not. However, it is very dependent on the quality of the gain stage. A lower quality gain stage will compromise the whole amplification chain. A nice thing about the "mixed" approach where amp stages can be volume controlled, is that you can tune them to the level where they sound best. - Just my five cents, from testing various Riaa stages and preamps, in my system.
The purist philosophy has been formulated as 'straight wire with gain'. My experiences point to the fact that the right combination of gain stages is a key for this 'with gain' part to work.. For example, having a Riaa with volume controls, I can tune it optimally as a source for my preamp. My preamp volume takes over, from there. Much like getting the right juices flowing, or mixing a sauce right. One might think, introducing one more gain stage is bad, but sometimes, it is not. However, it is very dependent on the quality of the gain stage. A lower quality gain stage will compromise the whole amplification chain. A nice thing about the "mixed" approach where amp stages can be volume controlled, is that you can tune them to the level where they sound best. - Just my five cents, from testing various Riaa stages and preamps, in my system.