Who is using passive preamps and why?

Paul, I also heard the Pass B1 at RMAF that year we met up. I would have tried one sooner, but its not balanced and I already have too many single ended passives lying around.

I'd love to hear the VRE-1. Next time I go to one of the LA/Orange County Audio Society events I'll see if I can visit Steve before or after and listen to it.

Tvad, thanks for the invite. I'll most likely be heading out for the Brooks Berdan event May 22. Monrovia is not that far from Burbank from what I recall. I'll contact you as the date nears.

Herman, What would you rather have? A system that hardly plays above a whisper at full volume or a system that plays loud at 9 o'clock? To say the requirements for passive and active are equal can be misleading to the unsuspecting Audiogon member reading this forum.

At the end of my last statement I mentioned "and the list goes on". Meaning there are many more factors to consider, including impedances between source, passive and amp.

I don't know if you personally use a passive preamp or not, but let's do an experiment and say you do. Let's take your incredibly high efficiency speaker out of the equation and replace it with a medium to low efficiency speaker leaving everything else the same. Now what do you have?

I understand your confusion and the confusion of other inexperienced audiophiles like yourself that have not had the oppportunity to experience a wide variety of equipment over the years of being involved in this hobby and learning from the ground up so to speak.

This forum is a great place to help one another with an accumulation of experience in a helpful manor without rude or condescending behavior so we all can learn and enjoy this hobby together.

Happy listening.

Herman doesn't sound inexperienced; not sure he was being rude either. But I do agree that a passive does take more thought to implement correctly than an active, no doubt about that IMHO.