balanced connection, better than single ended?

Phd,

"maybe I missed something but now I'm not sure. But I still want to see for myself".

That's the ticket. My ears are directly coupled to my pocketbook and by that I mean not going cheap, just getting some improvement for the money I spent and being aware of law of diminishing returns. That doesn't always happen when you buy theories or marketing.

I wonder what happens to a balanced preamp when the parts drift out of spec as they age. Single ended would age also but it's not relying on an identical twin aging at the same spec. I've never been able to get all 4 of the tires on my car to age at the same rate even with the rotate/balance ritual.

The raison d'etre of balanced line is to be able to use any balanced cable cable of any length (or cost) and have that cable have zero sonic artifact. So it does not matter the length (nor price); there is always an advantage to balanced lines.

In order to achieve that, the balanced line standard requires a low output impedance of its sources. This is poorly understood by the (IMO) majority of high end audio manufacturers, who often seem to regard balanced lines as trendy rather than the serious sonic boon that it is. As a result many high end audio products do not handle balanced signals nearly as well as they should, leading to varible results. This is why you see this question come up time and again on these forums!

A common myth is that balanced circuits require twice as much circuitry. This is untrue- quite often they require **less** circuitry as you have less noise, and thus less need for as many gain stages. Also, to build a differential balanced circuit does not require double the parts of its single-ended counterpart!

Yet another myth is that there is no advantage to using a balanced circuit with a single-ended input. As pointed out by Al, you retain the advantages of the circuit, you only loose the advantage of the cable. The gain **does not** change- that is to say you do not loose 6 db, as, at least with differential circuits, the input is looking for the *difference* between the inputs, which might be 2 opposite phases, or it might be the non-inverting input and ground. The differential input does not care.

Hello Arthmaspere.

" The raison d'etre of balanced line is to be able to use any balanced cable cable of any length (or cost) and have that cable have zero sonic artifact. So it does not matter the length (nor price); there is always an advantage to balanced lines."

By saying that "...that [balanced] cable have zero sonic artifact" do you imply that any sonic effect of cable capacitance, inductance and other electrical characteristics effecting the single ended cable sound - vanish? Gone? Diminished?

I would much appreciate if you can expand on this very interesting statement

Next point: Spectron wrote:

"I must state for the record that some (e.g. differential) balanced amplifiers will still utilize your single ended signal but most probably not in fullest extend - it can be debated."

and indeed you debate it - which is absolutely fine and even great! However, it confirms Spectron strong recommendation:

".... You got to speak with manufacturer of your equipment to untilize it in FULL."

Indeed, there are so many ideas, designs, technologies, ways of implementation that its almost a must.

Thank you !

do you imply that any sonic effect of cable capacitance, inductance and other electrical characteristics effecting the single ended cable sound - vanish? Gone? Diminished?

Yes, either gone entirely or dramatically diminished. IME 'gone' is a lot closer than 'diminished'.

Spectron is right that some differential amps will sound better with a balanced input. But- if the amp is properly designed, really the only difference that will be heard will be that the single ended source, plugged into such an amp, will sound inferior due to the cable artifact.

I did own the ARC VT-100 and thought it sounded better using the RCA inputs. The only balanced preamp I had (Sonic Frontiers) was not really that great anyway and the "single ended" preamp (ARC LS3) was really much better sounding anyway , imo, in my system. So, there are so many more factors that just "bal" - vs -"se".

I also tried running a Wadia CD player direct into the VT100 using the XLRs and I just dont think the two liked each other? I thought it may be causeing more than just a sonic mismatch problem.