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"Many months of research informs me of Gilberts design genius ,and no one has ever accused him of even average , so im considering this purchase seriously" It doesn’t matter. Its like food. If you don't like a certain type of food, it doesn't matter how good the chef is. Some of the smartest people in the world design audio equipment. That doesn't mean you have to like it all. This is a choice that only you can make. For your speakers you need an amp that provides good clean power. You can use tube or solid state. For tube, I would look at: ARC VT-100 (any version), Quicksilver V4, Cary V12, Sonic Frontiers Power 2 or 3. (Sonic Frontiers is very popular in Canada). For solid state: Ayre V-5, ARC Class T, or the older D series, Parasound Halo, Bryston 3 or 4 SST, Proceed HPA 2, Krell KAV 250a. (I mention the Krell because its very under rated and I see them sell at very low prices. All of those amps will do a very good job driving your speakers, but they all sound different. I'm pretty sure I've owned all of them at one time or another, so I know they can deliver enough power, you just have to pick the one that sounds best for you. My personal favorite for SS is the Ayre. I have the V-5's in my current system. For tube, I like the Quicksilver best. The VT-100 is almost as good and you can get very good deals on them used.

There's actually a good reason why you don't see too many options for 1 or 2 input preamps. If you wanted to take a full size line stage and make a 1 input version out of it, the cost would be almost the same. All the parts that cost the most money to make still have to be there. (Volume control, power supply, main circuitry). You could use a smaller case, main board and fewer connectors, but there wouldn't be too much of a savings. I'm just guessing, but a $5000 preamp would probably sell for something like $4500 in a 1 input version. As far as using some type of passive device as an alternative, I disagree with the other posters who recommend it. Normally, I wouldn't. Most of my CD players have digital volume controls, and I have several passive and active preamps. I can get great sound from all of them. If this was for personal use then yes, try all your different options. But for a review of a statement dac costing 25k and having no internal volume control, its supposed to be used with an active preamp. And the reality is that anyone who buys something like this will pair it with a preamp of similar price and quality. Maybe 1 or 2 people may use something like a Placette, but that wont be the norm. But in my opinion, reviewing with a passive is just too risky. Even if you get great results and give a positive review, someone can go out and buy the dac and the same passive that you used, and in some systems it just won't work.

They're mountain climbing terms. If you free climb without any ropes for safety, you have a fallible situation. You slip. You fall. You're dead. Safety ropes (hopefully), create a infallible situation.

High end audio and high end video are usually held to 2 different standards. Most audiophiles use un-amplified acoustic instruments played in a live setting, to serve as a reference. Video is different. All you can do is set your picture up to known specs like color, sharpness, black levels, etc.... And that's where it stops. There's no attempt to have a picture quality that resembles the original event. If you set your video system up in the same location where a movie was filmed and compared the video to the real life setting, the 2 wouldn't even be close. And the reason for that is film directors don't even try to achieve fidelity to the original event. If they did, the picture would probably look similar to a news broadcast. I doubt that would go over well with viewers, professional or amateur. Expectations are completely different for audio.

"Also listened to the Focal Electra 1008 BE and liked them but thought they were a bit bright, any recommendations on a pre / amp to tone these down?" Never buy components to fix flaws in other components. If the speakers can't do the job on their own without any help, pick something else.

If I remember correctly, I think you need to use a USB hub in a setup like you have. Have you checked it?

Regarding the OP, I thought the same thing until I read the article he referenced. Its one of the few pieces that explains the concept of biwiring correctly. Unless I missed something, I don't think anyone directly challenged that article. Not doing so probably allows a bit more latitude in the responses.

Yes, but only for people who don't know anything about audio. Most people that buy high end speakers understand what biamping or biwireing is.

40 post's and you're already pulling your hair out. This website is not the ideal place for this discussion. You talk about computer issues here. If you're looking to configure your OS or add a NAS to your setup, you've come to the right place. Things like biwiring speakers and hearing the differences require a level of experience that most people here just don't have. Its only natural they question it. I did, and I'm sure you did as well, when we were both new to the hobby. There is, however, one consideration that I would give concerning biwiring. There's Vandersteen, and there's everyone else. No other speaker responds to biwiring like Vandersteen does. Its not even close. That needs to be said because most people aren't aware of that. Also, he's the one who first came up with the concept of biwiring speakers, so if any speakers respond to biwiring, Vandersteen's should. (Everytime I mention that fact someone always says, Vandersteen did not come up with biwiring speakers for better SQ. My answer is still the same. Yes he did.)

No one likes to pay for anything. I wish I could get all my stuff for free. That said, if you dislike multiple sets of binding posts so much, you may want to call the manufacturer and ask them directly as to why them put them there. I'm guessing they give you 2 reasons. 1. Most of their customers want the option to biwire. And even if you don't biwire yourself, the speakers will hold their value better if you decide to sell them. The next owner may want to biwire. 2. Some people like to biamp their speakers, and you can't do that with just one set of posts. Some companies like Linn, put 3 or more sets of binding posts on their speakers.

From now on, just assume that I'm talking in context. Also, I won't use any other types of examples that aren't directly related to the topic being discussed. "Let me elaborate on a little on that. It is possible to build, say, an amplifier without really knowing much about them. There are plenty of example circuits one can crib and tweak randomly until satisfied. An individual who has done this is probably not the best person to explain how it works." I agree. I was referring to engineers that design in a professional capacity for known high end manufacturers. "However, someone with little or no scientific/engineering knowledge making claims contrary to the combined wisdom of many actual scientists and engineers is more than a little preposterous." There's really no way to answer that. You can be 100% right, or 100% wrong. Its too open ended. I would suggest we evaluate such claims on a case by case basis. "Very well, let's do the car analogy. Of course you don't need to know how the motor works in order to drive a car. However, discussions of audio components are often as though you insisted your Ford Focus did 0-60 mph in two seconds after you installed silver spark plug cables. When someone explains how this is physically impossible (due to engine power, torque, friction, etc.), you dismiss all this with a simplistic "well, I was driving, and I know what it felt like."" Yes, but that really doesn't mean anything. There will always be people who will believe whatever they want. There's also a learning curve to consider. Over the years my knowledge and experience has changed quite a bit. Over time, I think we'll all give different answers to the same question. "Of course a manufacturer should make sure potential customers like the product, whatever their reasons. No matter how rigorous your measurements, you can't cover every conceivable situation. Now if someone reports a problem, I'd imagine the first thing they do is attempt to replicate it in a controlled environment, then devise a measurement that captures it, and finally do something about it." I agree. Some problems can be dealt with in this manner. However, I was referring to the qualities in audio that can't be measured. (Actually, we probably can perform some kind of measurements to account for everything audible, but we just don't know how at this point in time.) And until we can measure otherwise, we have to rely on listening for some things.

There's no "XLR" circuit. XLR is just a 3 contact connector. The 2 circuit types are Balanced and SE. A SE signal can't be sent over a Balanced system. That's the main point of this whole discussion. If you want to use a balanced component with SE components, you need to configure the balanced piece to operate SE. When you do that, it makes the balanced component SE, literally. You can't run a balanced signal through it again until you undo the conversion. Its one or the other, and the change has to occur inside the component itself, thats why switches, cables and connectors won't work. If you look at the picture of the cable you posted with the xlr connector on one end, and the rca connector on the other, that's an unbalanced (SE) design. The rca connector has only 2 contact points. That means only 2 of the 3 pins on the xlr connector will be used making the entire cable SE. If you tried plugging the xlr end of that cable into a component operating balanced, it wouldn't work and can possibly do damage.

That's a convenient excuse. (I'm not saying its your excuse, just a general one that many use.) The minute anyone references the engineer that built an audio component, everyone usually goes nuts. You can't have it both ways. I agree. The engineer who built the audio component should know it best, but no one usually excepts him as a valid source due to "bias". From there, its just the endless argument. Also, on this part specifically, I think you're wrong. (For the most part. There can be exceptions.) "Without the hard work of scientists and engineers, none of your precious equipment would even exist, yet you somehow claim to know better how it works than the very people who built it. That is infuriating." There's a big difference between a listener "knowing what he hears" and knowing how a component works. A listener doesn’t have to know how a component works any more than you do about how the motor in your car works in order to drive it. I believe you asked me about my brother who has perfect pitch, in another thread. He has no idea how an instrument tuner works, but he's certainly qualified to tell the engineer who made it if its accurate. A more relative example would be myself. I do quite a bit of beta testing on audio components. A designing engineer will give me a work in progress and ask for my opinion on it. My comments, along with opinions from many other testers, are taken very seriously. So much so that products are not released until the listeners are happy, regardless of measurements, specs, etc... The theory is simple. If we don't like it, the customers probably won't either. This is a practice that every single successful manufacturer adheres to. So, when you say that comments by listeners infuriate you when they question the engineers, understand that these same engineers rely on listeners comments when building their components.

No. This isn't a cable or connector issue. Its internal. When you switch a fully balanced component to run in SE, the circuit changes. Its one or the other and you can't have them both plugged in at the same time. The easiest way to visualize this it with jumpers. On some components, you make the change from balanced to SE operation by inserting small jumpers in the xlr connectors themselves. You short/connect 2 of the pins. After you do that, you can then plug cables into the SE rca connectors. You can't use the xlr connectors again until you remove the jumpers. You can do the same thing with switches instead of jumpers, but the same rules apply.

Are your speakers the M30 or M33? I had the 33's and found that they weren't too good for music. Very dark sounding speaker that sounded more like a movie theater than an audio system.