Snarkonmars, what I meant was that some products have an XLR connection when the internal circuitry is single-ended. There is no advantage to the connector; the advantage lies in the topography.
BTW any balanced preamp will convert a single-ended signal to balanced without issue or degradation, as part of the normal operation of the preamp. We've not been providing single-ended connections for the most part (although we have always had 2 single-ended line inputs) in an effort to convince the user to hook things up right and get the most out of the preamp as a result (I'm sure that's why BAT has does it that way too). That's why we've always had a balanced input for the phono (in fact we were the first to offer that feature), as it is a balanced source anyway.
BTW any balanced preamp will convert a single-ended signal to balanced without issue or degradation, as part of the normal operation of the preamp. We've not been providing single-ended connections for the most part (although we have always had 2 single-ended line inputs) in an effort to convince the user to hook things up right and get the most out of the preamp as a result (I'm sure that's why BAT has does it that way too). That's why we've always had a balanced input for the phono (in fact we were the first to offer that feature), as it is a balanced source anyway.