Best preamp is no preamp: always true?

Not at all always true. It really depends on the driver stage of the source, which is often a cheap OP amp. Furthermore, volume controls on CDP are often in the digital spectrum, which means that when you lower the volume from full, you are affecting (lowering) the sampling rate of the digital signal.
There are sources out there that have real analog volume control and exellent driver stages... where a good pre-amp might just get in the way of the music, but I think it is more the exception than the rule.

Actually SoGood also answers the question in favor of preamps.

You have to spend what he calls "big bucks" to improve over a well designed passive volume control.

Note first the volume control has to be well made/designded. Note also that if you have the bucks to spend a preamp is better even in his opinion.

I personally also want/need a preamp. I just don't listen only to CD's. Also a lot of CD's are poorly engineered. The good preamp will make those CDs sound better than the raw data.

S23chang

French bordeaux?...hardly "essential" to the act of drinking wine.

Volume control..."essential", ever try listening to music without it?.

Let me be more clear for you:

If one only needs to control volume, a well built passive volume control (in my case...Bent Audio passive)... you will in my experience have a hard time finding an active preamp that does not degrade sound quality to a greater degree than the passive unit at under $3,000 (new). I'll mention that I paid $1,100 (new) for my Bent Audio passive.

Very good active preamps do not degrade sound quality to any large degree...no advantage to a passive here IMO. I'll use Placette Audio as an example here because they make both types of components and are well known to audiophiles.

I have listened to the Placette passive but not the active. The Placette passive almost made it into my system and was better sounding in some ways than the Bent Audio unit I went with...yes, even passives sound different.

A search will confirm that the Placette active preamp tops the passive unit in sound quality...no supprise and answers the question...NO, it's not always true that the best preamp is no preamp, although...it can be "sometimes" true up to a point.

In case you did not know, passives do not mate with all components so will not work well in all systems...the main reason I sold... after changing speakers/amp/room as mentioned above.

Dave

Agree and disagree with some of you. When I was looking at preamps I found that many of the high end preamps had just OK volume pots. When I was looking for a replacement volume pot for my preamp, I researhed what the manufacturers were using versus what was available as a "better" volume pot. It was intersting in also speaking with First Sound and what volume pots are in their preamps. So as much as this thread is about to preamp or not to preamp, you should check what volume pot is in your preamp first IMO.

Happy Listening.

Bigkidz, could you elaborate on what was interesting about First Sound's volume pots? Just curious because they're on my shortlist to audition. Thanks, Ken