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Volume control question

I wasn't sure if I should post my question here or under the Digital section but I figured this section gets a bit more traffic and its probably more relevant. I was reading a couple of articles talking about how digital volume controls could negatively affect sound quality, bit-stripping, etc. My bottom line takeaway was its not a good thing. This made me think about those of us who have streamers which provide a user mobile application which allows volume control among other things like music selection, etc. Is this considered a "digital" volume control? Is it better to set the volume to "fixed" as opposed to "variable" on the device and control the volume from the preamp? I haven't done a blindfold A/B test but I don't think I can tell a difference. Anyone else wondered about this or I'm just thinking too much...

Thanks. 

kalali
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georgehifi's avatar
georgehifi
10,312 posts
 
I see this a lot, and there are two ways it can be fixed. "bit stripping" happens below 70% of full output on a digital domain volume control. 

1:This is why thoughtful/concerned source manufacturers like Wadia, Mark Levinson, Bricasti and a few others have "gain settings links" on some of their upper end models in the analogue output stage, to limit the maximum gain. So then the digital volume control upstream can be used at 70% or higher, for any system.

2:If you don't have these analogue gain settings, the next best is to use a passive volume control after the source, and set the volume on the passive so the digital volume on the source can be used above 70% this way you can still use the source remote volume control between 70 and 100%

Cheers George    
kalali's avatar
kalali OP
1,977 posts
 

Thanks George. I couldn't quite follow the details of what you described but I get the 70% threshold. I was sort of using 50% as a bogie but will now change that to 70%. Between the (analog) volume control on the preamp and the volume control on the mobile app its pretty easy to modulate the desired listening levels.

Ironically, the entire premise of this discussion is based on the laziness to get off our butts and just change the volume. First world challenges...

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