[A Jedi]

Well, instead of asking endless questions, I threw my Freya between the Bifrost and HP amps to see what happens. Volume out of Audirvana is at 0 (no attenuation), HP amp volumes set at their sweet spots. All volume control through Freya. Audiophile buzzwords happened. There may have been a unicorn prancing through a rainbow. Freya's too big for my desk though , I hope a Saga will perform similarly.

 

[yonson]

Freya's too big for my desk though , I hope a Saga will perform similarly.

This is why I was hoping for either a balanced Saga sized Pre or a Jotunheim with a remote. Jason states neither is happening, so I'm keeping an eye out for a dead Jotunheim so I can make my own remote controlled balanced pre in that size...

 

[Pietro Cozzi Tinin]

This is why I was hoping for either a balanced Saga sized Pre or a Jotunheim with a remote. Jason states neither is happening, so I'm keeping an eye out for a dead Jotunheim so I can make my own remote controlled balanced pre in that size...

Uh.. Why an rc for a desk model?
Very short arms?

 

[BagelJoe]

Ordered Mani at 9:16, shipping notice at 10:57. Nice service. Just a shout out after some old stories of issues.

Thanks Schiit

 

[A Jedi]

Luckily I don't need the balanced outs at my desk.

 

[A Jedi]

Uh.. Why an rc for a desk model?
Very short arms?

To change the volume from bed

 

[golfbravobravo]

Luckily I don't need the balanced outs at my desk.

You should definitely put them away before you are reported to HR!!

 

[yonson]

Uh.. Why an rc for a desk model?
Very short arms?

It's not on my desk, and it's not for a headphone setup...

 

[Rattle]

Using HD600s. Amps are Liquid Spark (on low gain) and Crack. I can lower the signal on Audirvana but everyone's saying "don't do volume control before the DAC". And yes compressed recordings are worse but it's not limited to that. It's a general problem.

Well I use gain in Jriver to lower the signal when it's real hot about 3db. It's bit perfect so I don't see any issue with that. It's not like I'm using volume from windows for volume before the dac. Audirvana should be similar.. I'd rather do that than stick my saga in the signal path. Love the saga for my vidar and speakers but I can hear it changes the sound if it's in front of my headphone amps.

 

[Rensek]

Well, instead of asking endless questions, I threw my Freya between the Bifrost and HP amps to see what happens. Volume out of Audirvana is at 0 (no attenuation), HP amp volumes set at their sweet spots. All volume control through Freya. Audiophile buzzwords happened. There may have been a unicorn prancing through a rainbow. Freya's too big for my desk though , I hope a Saga will perform similarly.

Saga should perform admirably. To date my best experience with my Magni 3 was when I was feeding it with saga. Turn that pot all the way to full and let saga work it's magic.

 

[A Jedi]

Well I use gain in Jriver to lower the signal when it's real hot about 3db. It's bit perfect so I don't see any issue with that. It's not like I'm using volume from windows for volume before the dac. Audirvana should be similar.. I'd rather do that than stick my saga in the signal path. Love the saga for my vidar and speakers but I can hear it changes the sound if it's in front of my headphone amps.

I dunno. Took Freya out of signal chain and now I'm using Audirvana volume control. It's not the same. Some audiophile buzzwords disappeared.

 

[Rattle]

I dunno. Took Freya out of signal chain and now I'm using Audirvana volume control. It's not the same. Some audiophile buzzwords disappeared.

Buzzwords aside, you may like any roll off or frequency changes having the freya in the path introduces. For me having the saga in the path isn't bad or good I guess. It does change the sound and I prefer it not to as I think it sounds better without it. I'd like to try a goldpoint but they are expensive. At the end of the day having the ability through Audirvana/Jriver bitperfect is the way to go since you're using it anyway.

 

[Rensek]

I think a main selling point on the saga and Freya pre amps is how transparent and uncolored they are. They do a better job of passing the signal through then standard pots. I think they are providing as virgin of a signal as possible. Part of what makes them so popular. Here, that other site, ASR, all have glowing reviews of the Schiit pre amps.

 

[A Jedi]

Buzzwords aside, you may like any roll off or frequency changes having the freya in the path introduces.

Well that's the thing, I wasn't hearing any rolloff - quite the opposite, both lows and highs were extended. I didn't want to use audiophile terms cause I'm not that guy but...everything sounded clearer, more spacious (perhaps due to extended highs?). Better bite in the bass region. Just sounded more real.

 

[CAPT Deadpool]

That would have been the easy thing to do. Unfortunately at full tilt the background noise is a tad too high for me.



Interesting thought. But if I'm going to be anal about this (which I will be), I'll just take the entire pot out of the path.

I would advise against removing the volume pot from a Crack with out replacing it with a new one. I believe the stock pot is 100Kohms.

Dumbed down explanation (I don't claim to be an expert here, this is the best I can do)These potentiometers are voltage dividers (at least when three pins per channel are used per gang aka signal 2 for SE stereo and 4 for balanced stereo). They send a variable portion of the signal to the grid of the first tube in the circuit and return the rest to ground. The potentiometer ALWAYS presents an average 100K ohm impedance (not resistance which is DC but impedance which is AC and varies some by frequency). This provides the Crack amplifier circuit with a 100K ohm impedance on the input. The Jotenheim has a 50K ohm input impedance and the Asgard 3 22K. This is provided by the Alps RK27 50K ohm 4-gang potentiometer in the case of the Jotenheim. Without an attenuator or potentiometer your amplifier would have minimal input impedance with bad results likely lots of noise.

You might learn more from reviewing this page, I don't pretend to understand it all.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Input_impedance

I'm sure @Jason Stoddard or @Doc B. could enlighten us more.