Does the volume control effect sound quality?

He asked "Am i imagining things?" I say no he's not and give him the reasons that's all.
And I'm not saying the Lightspeed Attenuator is the answer, even it doesn't quite sound as good as going direct. In fact I've said many times if you want to hear the truth of what the source is giving, then listen to your source directly pluged into the poweramp with a very quite cd. Then listen at the same level with a pre (active or passive) in the way at the same level, then go with the one that sounds closest to the direct sound. Because this is the one that is least imprinting (colouration/distortion) it's own signature onto the music signal compared to the direct sound, and therefore is the closest to the most transparent sounding eg: (a piece of wire with or without gain)

Cheers George

I don't think anyone on this thread has denied that the volume control makes a difference. However there are engineering principles in play and they are such that if ignored, the result could be that a $4.00 volume control from Radio Shack can sound better than the best light-activated volume control system available.

There are plenty of other situations where that is likely not the case. IOW this cannot be taken out of context- the parameters of the surrounding circuits cannot be ignored. So if a light activated device is to be used, it would have to be one that is designed for the circuit.

Here is a good article for those who are interested to see how much their active preamp or passive volume control, is adding colourations/distortions to their sound.
It's called the "Ravel's Bolero Test" and you need a CD or LP of it or like it to conduct the test.
http://www.high-endaudio.com/RC-Linestages.html click on Bolero Test, scroll down to "CD Player?" if you have a cd player

It is basically doing what I suggest you do 2 posts back

Cheers George

That website is terrible!

Are you saying Arthur's opinions are terrible or his website is not user friendly?