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Cross-talk and distortion, chief soundstage contributors...

In my continuing effort to learn about the "chemistry" of sound, I have recently been informed that it is significantly low (vanishing) distortion and avoiding crosstalk that supply the key sonic elements for deep, broad, tall, etc. soundstage... this, of course, is independent of speakers, pre-amp, cables, etc. I'm focusing on the amplifier, alone... Again, the issue here are the fundamental (amplifier) qualities involved in soundstage. Can anyone add some dimension to what I'm learning in this...

Thanks in advance,
listening99
georgehifi's avatar
georgehifi
10,312 posts
 


Trouble with that is there goes the sound of the owners prized dac, because now there’s inferior cheap digital stages in use in the signal path. Been down that dead end path, trying to do digital domain xovers, you ruin any class your prize dac had.    
heaudio123
689 posts
 
That makes no sense to me. Most high end DACs have very good reclocking if not buffer and reclocking such that external jitter sources make almost no difference and even if it did, an <$10 clock source with a tolerable power supply is essentially jitter free. Way less issue than anything you would do in the analog domain.  It's no different from things such as external oversamplers, etc 
georgehifi's avatar
georgehifi
10,312 posts
 
That makes no sense to me.


No it wouldn’t until you’ve tried it, too much converting back and forward, just like slotting in a digital active xover like a Deqx or mini DSP instead of using a very good analog active xover like the Pass B4.
Same deal all round, one becomes very sterile and digitizes’s sound, the other doesn’t and keeps the harmonic structure in tact. And the sound of your prized dac.
heaudio123
689 posts
 
We already started digital remember? There is no conversion. If you start with a digital source no analog crossover (signal level) will ever touch a digital crossover.
tweak1
3,671 posts
 
After reading ~ 10 ,posts with no mention of deferentially balanced amp and preamp I tapped out
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