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Help with finding ultra-transparent pre-amp

I got a new player, Wadia 581i SE, and once I hooked it up directly to amps I realized that my pre-amp is not transparent enough.
To make a long story short, I would like to find a very transparent pre-amp to be inserted between player and amps (no coloration, no shift in tonality, and no loss in dynamics, micro or macro), that would result in a sound indistinguishable from the sound of my player going directly to amps.
Essentially I want a wire with attenuation control. Balanced connectivity is preferred.
I tried a transformers based passive pre-amp (it was a custom, very well executed job), result was not good, not only that it killed dynamics and resulted in a dull and uninteresting sound, but transparency was in fact worse in comparison with my present pre-amp.
Is there such a transparent pre-amp, or it is just a pipe dream?
The cost is of course to be considered, I would not go for anything that is more than let’s say 3.5K, new or used.
I have been reading about Placette (resistor based), has anyone had any experience using it in a system that has very resolving front end?
The rest of my system:
Bryston BP26 pre-amp
Bryston 7B SST amps
PMC IB2 speakers
sashav
tvad
9,467 posts
 
A used Atma-Sphere MP-3 is in the price range, and is differentially balanced.

My MP-1 is very transparent, and I believe the MP-3 has a similar house sound.

The Audio Horizons preamp is another possibility, and it's available with an in-home trial.
sashav OP
64 posts
 
Darkmoebius,

The problem was not with 7B SST input sensitivity or Wadia’s output (which I did not adjust BTW), and here is why.
I had another player available during this mini session, Esoteric DV50, which gives much higher voltage on output, problems with TVC were the same. Music was louder, but still dull, no dynamics, and with loss of transparency in comparison to Wadia direct (Esoteric of course could not go direct to amps since it has no its own volume control).
Also, TVC I had was balanced unit, so I used 2V setting on 7B SST which works well for balanced, it was balanced out of Wadia into TVC and balanced into 7B SST.
sashav OP
64 posts
 
Bar81, please let me know what the results are once Ayre arrives.
BTW, have you ever compared your Wadia with 581 SE without GNSC mods?
bar81
754 posts
 
Sashav, will do, should be here on Saturday. As to my 861se, I upgraded from a 850 straight to the GNSC model.
rleff
1,065 posts
 
What about one of stan klynes' pre amps?
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