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Exactly

Just about every single feature in a preamp will degrade the sound to some degree. For example, an input selector switch will degrade the sound compared to just having a single hard-wired input. Similarly, a volume control will degrade the sound compared to having a fixed-gain circuit.

So both the designer and the purchaser are constantly having to make decisions about trading off performance for convenience. In the case of an input selector switch and a volume control, just about everybody wants one. But even in those cases there are some tough decisions to be made.

In the old days, before remote controls, it wasn't too hard to find a manually operated rotary switch that wouldn't degrade the sound too much. And if you spent a lot of money on a mil-spec switch with solid-silver contacts, the degradation was negligible. But for remote controls, it is a different story. It is a lot trickier to get good sound with a remotely-controllable input selector switch.

And don't get me started on volume controls. The old manual potentiometers weren't all that great sounding, but at least their faults tended to be subtractive and non-offensive. But creating a remote-control volume control that doesn't degrade the sound is definitely a non-trivial task. In fact, this is probably the single biggest reason that surround-sound processors don't sound as good as a good stereo preamp -- they all use a terrible-sounding op-amp based volume control.

My intention was to educate and not to disparage. There are just a series of choices to be made. There are no right or wrong answers. As long as you are happy with the sound and the user interface, then there are no problems. Some people favor performance over convenience, and some the other way around. And sometimes it is possible to offer both, but this normally comes at a higher dollar cost.

In an ideal world, the education is something that the magazines would do. But for whatever reason they don't generally do so. I was pleased to see in the April Hi-Fi News that Paul Miller pointed out that switching power supplies require extra attention to make sure that they don't degrade the sound.

There are plenty of other things that could also be discussed. For example, when we were first designing the V-3 in the early '90s, we considered using a vertical "tower" format. Tower computers were just coming into vogue, and it seemed like a "cool" look. But when you look at the physics of the situation, it is a decidedly non-optimal solution.

If you take a typical solid-state power amp where the fins run along the sides, you can make some generalizations. Making the amp twice as deep will double the cooling capacity. But making the amp twice as tall will only increase the cooling capacity by 41% (square root of two). This is because a the top part of a taller fin receives air that has been pre-heated by the bottom part of the fin. It's simply not an efficient use of heatsink material.

But again, there are no right or wrong answers. As long as there is sufficient cooling to get the job done, the only penalty to a vertical amp format is an economic one. And so it may be worth it to some people to pay extra for a certain look (or the ability to fit into a specific sized area).

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