Okay to use RCA adapter on a fully balanced amp?

OP,

Any difference is likely to be small. In this price range of gear cables tend to be less important than in really pricy stuff.

There are no absolutes in audio, but audio components are like scientific instruments, the better and more resolving they get the more small differences tend to make a big difference. So, for instance, the manufacturer of my amp and preamp recommends using XLR interconnects. So, I tried both. I really couldn’t tell the difference. I did not spend weeks comparing… but I still went ahead with the XLR (this was a $17K preamp and $22K amp). I think the quality of the interconnect typically makes a bigger difference.

A similar discussion came up on a Denafrips DAC forum. Because the Denafrips are R2R ladder DACs and fully balanced there’s four ladders to support the left (signal A and signal -A) and right (signal A and signal -A) channels. By using a single ended connection only the signal A ladders are contributing to the output being sent to the amplifier.

If you use a unbalanced RCA cable with an XLR connector on the amplifier end I would expect that the signal -A pin on each channel would not be connected. Components that are not fully balanced but do have balanced outputs use something to create the signal -A by inverting the signal. If your amplifier doesn’t have unbalanced inputs then it probably doesn’t have any mechanism to create the signal -A which would mean your amplifier would only be using half of it’s internal bits.

In your shoes, I’d absolutely work towards a balanced preamplifier.

@soix, is correct!

Mike

Sound will suffer.

@soix stated it well. I agree with doing the OPs ask totally wastes the abilities paid (probably dearly) for.

The only way that he is going to find out if it sounds worse to him is by comparing it Most of what is around here is theory.