mtflycaster
Member
I'll admit to being a vintage gear junkie, as much as my budget will allow. For me, it's not just about sound. I'm a gear head and appreciate well constructed designs.
But it seems there is a movement towards, or preference for, simpler designs in order to achieve the best sound. Or maybe I'm just now noticing what have always been different design philosophies.
For example, the use of buffers (which just seem to be impedance management devices), and some simple boxes that just switch around inputs and outputs (no other signal processing) has seemingly become more prevalent. And there are some highly thought of preamps, for example, that appear to have pretty straightforward circuit designs, such as the Aragons, Thresholds, etc. Even some of the somewhat coveted SS McIntosh preamps are op amp based designs that seem simple enough (and, fundamentally, pretty cost-effective to manufacture). And my old Phase Linear 2000, which sounds pretty darn good, is a simple design, using only 4 dual op amps.
In principle, a simpler design makes sense to me if the objective is great sound...as there is less screwing around with the audio signal. But then I see some highly regarded preamps that are packed full with discrete parts and lots of electrolytic caps and seem like complex designs with lots of signal processing, yet apparently sound great (e.g, some of the Kenwood's).
What am I missing? Is a simpler design not necessarily better? Or do more complex designs process the audio signal in ways intended to change or convert the input signal to make it sound "better" to the most number of people? None of the above?
Just some ramblings on a beautiful day in SW Colorado!
MTFly
But it seems there is a movement towards, or preference for, simpler designs in order to achieve the best sound. Or maybe I'm just now noticing what have always been different design philosophies.
For example, the use of buffers (which just seem to be impedance management devices), and some simple boxes that just switch around inputs and outputs (no other signal processing) has seemingly become more prevalent. And there are some highly thought of preamps, for example, that appear to have pretty straightforward circuit designs, such as the Aragons, Thresholds, etc. Even some of the somewhat coveted SS McIntosh preamps are op amp based designs that seem simple enough (and, fundamentally, pretty cost-effective to manufacture). And my old Phase Linear 2000, which sounds pretty darn good, is a simple design, using only 4 dual op amps.
In principle, a simpler design makes sense to me if the objective is great sound...as there is less screwing around with the audio signal. But then I see some highly regarded preamps that are packed full with discrete parts and lots of electrolytic caps and seem like complex designs with lots of signal processing, yet apparently sound great (e.g, some of the Kenwood's).
What am I missing? Is a simpler design not necessarily better? Or do more complex designs process the audio signal in ways intended to change or convert the input signal to make it sound "better" to the most number of people? None of the above?
Just some ramblings on a beautiful day in SW Colorado!
MTFly
