Don't the Pass XP preamps have selectable gain?

Hmm, can you provide a bit more info about that? What's the issue?

I own the XP-20 and just reread the manual regarding gain. Their are two settings, high and low. I quote, "The gain control toggles between two settings, offset from one another by 5 dB. The high gain selects +8dB and the low selects 4dB as the maximum volume (step 63) setting. I do not know about the XP-10, though I seem to remember that it also has two gain settings but they are different from the XP-20. I think they are something like 0 and 10. It should be specified in the manual.

Regarding Zeneith's point, he may mean that digital and analogue have different levels of gain from the source, so switching between the two may produce quite a difference in volume. In my case, this is exasperated by the fact that my phono cable is single ended and my CD cable is balanced (+6dB). I don't often switch between the two, but I can see how it would be annoying.

Ah, input level matching. Yes, I understand.

Now that you mention it I also seem to recall seeing something about the XP-10 having 0 or 10dB of gain. The online manuals don't seem to have this info.

It's too bad Pass / Wayne decided to forego the Mono control on the XP series. That comes in handy sometimes.

Tony,
I just compare the XP-20 manual which I received with my preamp to the online manual from the Pass Labs website. They are not the same document. In my manual, there is a paragraph located between the "Theater pass through" section and the "Electronic volume control" section which describes in good detail what the gain settings are. I quoted from this section in my post above. For some reason, it does not appear in the on-line manual. There are also other differences between the two manuals.

Hmm, I don't suppose one of them is the mentioning of a mono switch? :-)