Pre-outs?
nascarmann
Posts: 1,464
Why do receivers have pre-outs? Are they for looks? Does one brand of receiver have better pre-outs?
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KING WANNABE
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Post edited by nascarmann on
Comments
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I am pretty sure they are used to hook up External Power Amps.
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can you loop your pre out to a input to re asin the internal amp? i am not using 1 of my chanels on my recever can i loop the sub out and drive a sub with it?
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Why,
why do you want to do that?Looping signals,try it and post back,this should be good.Dan
My personal quest is to save to world of bad audio, one thread at a time. -
i uesed to do that with a old yamaha receiver that had rca pre outs and pre ins or (main in) + - what i did is take the u connector off, and run rca interconnets to a seperate amp you can bi amp with y connectors by spliting and runing back into the receiver through the mains in, then you can run speaker cables from the receiver and the amp to a two post speaker with the jumpers removed, for biamping. rt-7 mains
rt-20p surounds
cs-400i front center
cs-350 ls rear center
2 energy take 5, efects
2- psw-650 , subs
1- 15" audiosource sub
lets all go to the next ces. -
They're not for looks, they do vary in quality, and they are for getting external amps into the system. I run my old Adcom GFA-555 on the front stereo portion of my HT system, feeding it signal from a Denon 3801. Adcom powers 1989 Polk Monitor 10Bs. Advantages: 10B impedence rated at 6 ohms, mine actually bench-tested 4.5, so I'm getting roughly 300 wpc to them from the Adcom, while the Denon is rated at 105 wpc across all 7 channels. So I have more power. Also, I run multi outs to a smaller amp to run speakers in a separate room. Disadvantages: External amps introduce tonal colorations. Also, I have one hell of a hard time balancing this system out for movies. Sounds GREAT for music, but I have to crank the side and back surrounds pretty hard, or turn down front speakers, or both, to get a DVD to do its stuff. It's a compromise, really, for dinosaurs like me who came from the world of separates and 2-channel stereo, went into surround receivers kicking and screaming, and wallowed in sentimentality over large-**** power amps they couldn't bear to throw away.
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I forgot to mention that preouts shouldn't be confused with EXT. INs, which many receivers also have. Those are analog connections for players like DVD-A and SACD. At first that made no sense to me, but the way it was explained to me is that all the DAC takes place in the players, then you run an analog signal out from each channel to the receiver. Select EXT IN for your playback mode on the receiver, and the DVD-A or the SACD feeds signal from each individual channel through the receiver, directly to speakers. It bypasses the receiver's surround processor entirely. My Denon has EXT INS for 7.1 external units. I'm told this is supposed to sound absolutely fantastic, but I don't have a DVD-A or SACD player, so I wouldn't know. Even Neil Young, who hates all things digital, is said to be delighted with the DVD-A multichannel mix of his 1972 album "Harvest" -- see the recent issue of ICE magazine.
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Pre-outs are useful because the system volume control affects their level the same way it affects that of the built in amps. As already mentioned, you could feed a separate amp this way. I use the left & right preouts to feed the line level inputs of a subwoofer, which is another common application.
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jeberhart,
You post is just about exactly where I come from on using a receiver as a preamp.The tonal changes from one amp to another is distracting when watching movies.It makes your speakers sound different.I don't care for that.
But,for 2 channel there is something gained as you stated in your post.
Another thing would be using a5 or 7 channel amp to improve home theater as well as 2 channel,then no tonal changes would occur.Now the only negitive thing about this if you use another brand amp then your receiver, the output voltage could be different and then you might not get all the beauty out of the nice 5 or 7 channel amp you put into the mix.
I have found using the same manufactor amp and preamp mates better then mixing and matching.Maybe its just my ears but I find a complete harmony this way.Mixing changes the sound slighty sometimes for the worse.Dan
My personal quest is to save to world of bad audio, one thread at a time. -
Yes, Mantis, I'm with you on the brand issue here, even though I'm breaking my own rule mixing Adcom and Denon. I've never bought into any kind of belief that keeping the same brand of equipment throughout a system is an advantage, EXCEPT when it comes to two things: Amplification and loudspeakers. It just makes better sense to mate a preamp and amp from the same company, because the production values and tonal characteristics are (supposedly) fairly consistent throughout the product line. Same with speakers. One of these days I'll probably just upgrade the Denon to one of the more powerful models, and use the Adcom either to go out to another room, or in the same room but as part of an entirely separate two channel system. In another thread, I believe you actually suggested I do that in this rig...but I'm just so LAZY right now........:o
