Yep, that is what I normally do as well when I am experimenting, select one particular device to control volume and set the others to 100%. I borrowed this practice from devices that do the same for you (e.g. the AK240 goes to 100% Vol when you select line output mode) under the assumption that this choice by AK engineers indicates that this practice at least minimizes the impact of the unnecessary attenuators. I try to use the HA-1 as volume control when possible because of its remote
.
I know that there are now unnecessary circuits in the signal path, but it still sounds good enough, at least enough to know if the changes in componentry I made had a positive or negative impact. There are options to avoid this when going from experimenting with signal chains to selecting a permanent one, for example the RWAK'ing includes bypassing the volume controls for line outputs to get a true line output from an AK DAP, which I have on the list to do for certain components once (if) I get to that point. In the case of the home theater bypass on the HA-1, I believe that this is an implementation of this kind of measure, but I haven't confirmed that components are truly electrically removed from the path vs. doing what the AK does and setting vol attenuator to 100% output, I am sure it is either documented somewhere or someone has confirmed this, I just don't remember given all of the different gear I have been reading about, tough to keep straight who does what and how...