Question Do signal attenuators reduce sound quality?

giocap

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Feb 7, 2023
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I purchased 2 zerozone S1000W CLASS D monoblock power amps. Love them, great detail and dynamics.

Unfortunately i live in an appartment, and my preamplifier now must be set at 15-20% volume, to get my usual normal listening volume.
At 40% volume my walls shake.
I sincerely believe my woofers would explode if i raised the volume at 100%.

I basically have put a weapon in my living room that may cause hearing loss and actual damage to my speakers.

So i was thinking to put attenuators on my rca cables


Do these devices cause loss of audio quality?
 

Gray

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Do these devices cause loss of audio quality?
He will correct me if I'm wrong, but I think another member here found that those very ones did adversely affect sound.
Whereas he found that the Rothwell ones were fine.

However, yet another member has reported adverse effects from the Rothwells.

If you do compare before and after though, ensure that you compensate with the volume to ensure level matching - as a level difference will certainly influence your verdict.

Personally, I'd avoid the ones in your link - if only for the fact that switches are involved.
 
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giocap

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Agreed... those switches introduce unneeded complexity. Can't find rothwells fore less than 70eur here in italy.... this "should" be an easy device.... does anybody have positive experiences with a cheaper brand?
 

Noddy

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Mar 16, 2023
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I purchased 2 zerozone S1000W CLASS D monoblock power amps. Love them, great detail and dynamics.

Unfortunately i live in an appartment, and my preamplifier now must be set at 15-20% volume, to get my usual normal listening volume.
At 40% volume my walls shake.
I sincerely believe my woofers would explode if i raised the volume at 100%.

I basically have put a weapon in my living room that may cause hearing loss and actual damage to my speakers.

So i was thinking to put attenuators on my rca cables


Do these devices cause loss of audio quality?

Now maybe I‘m being a bit thick, it wouldn’t be the first time, but you have two 1000W single channel amps in an apartment, would it perhaps not be a sensible idea to get something a bit more in keeping with the setting? A bit of a wildball suggestion I know, but worth consideration, no?

Of course you might want to retain the ability to simulate an earthquake, and empty the apartment block in minutes.

There is a very famous prize, a chap promised to give a huge wodge of dosh to anyone who could in a blind test recognise two amps. The only condition was that one had to be equalised to the same frequency response as the other one, and both had to be operating normally i.e. not clipping or distorting. I believe he had thousands of entrants, noone managed to pass the test.
 
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Gray

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There is a very famous prize, a chap promised to give a huge wodge of dosh to anyone who could in a blind test recognise two amps. The only condition was that one had to be equalised to the same frequency response as the other one, and both had to be operating normally i.e. not clipping or distorting. I believe he had thousands of entrants, noone managed to pass the test.
That's interesting.
Wish I'd been offered money to recognise the 3 amps I had on home loan.
On paper they were all the same (spec and price).
An equalised FR might have narrowed the gap between 2 of them.
But the most noticeable difference was in the energy of the delivery - the best sounding light years ahead of the worst.....the sort of difference your Mum couldn't miss ;)
 

Noddy

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That's interesting.
Wish I'd been offered money to recognise the 3 amps I had on home loan.
On paper they were all the same (spec and price).
An equalised FR might have narrowed the gap between 2 of them.
But the most noticeable difference was in the energy of the delivery - the best sounding light years ahead of the worst.....the sort of difference your Mum couldn't miss ;)

I too could swear that my AudioLab, Arcam and Teac amps sounded totally different, neutral, boomy and scratchy, but I doubt neither you nor I are somehow better than the contestants, I think there were thousands.

Something odd is going on, psychoacoustics perhaps.

My guess is that differences in frequency response fool us into attributing characteristics that are not there. Maybe this is due to our need to recognise peoples voices quickly, to attribute characteristics to them.
 

gasolin

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Noddy it's only 1000 watt in 2 ohm, in 8 ohm it's 600 watt :)

OP get a tube buffer, preamp https://audiokarma.org/forums/index.php?threads/fx-audio-6j1-tube-preamp-a-31-wonder.848535/

Turn the wolume down to a level where it's only loud on your main preamp above 12 o'clock

Most passive volume knobs havn't got enough gain to max out most speakers by them selv mabye one of these

How is your setup ?

Any channel inbalance at low levels ? (with that kind of power channel imbalance would be so not wanted)
 
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Gray

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His neigbours must be wiping their foreheads with relief.

My amp is 50W per channel, it plays far louder than I would ever need, even with insensitive speakers.
I'm also on 50W, but only listen at close range.

In his defence, there's no doubt that greater power reserves (usually) improve normal-level sound - making the argument that you can never have too much.
 
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Gray

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If the speaker cannot handle the power then the excess watts are of little use in increasing SPL, but extremely useful in increasing distortion/ripping the cone apart.
[/QUOTE
I was talking about normal listening levels, as opposed to sustained, speaker-damaging stupidity 😉
It's the very short bursts of power that give excitement to music - speakers routinely handle those.
 

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