Balanced Inputs and Outputs
 

Curious to know if anyone knows (not opinion) why CJ has never used balanced inputs and outputs. No intention to start a flame war! Peace be upon us.

This was in a previous review of a CJ preamp from Bill Conrad:

"Going balanced is a solution looking for a problem. The problem doesn’t exist in home audio, but it’s very real for medical equipment or in the recording studio. Balanced just complicates the design, and we adamantly don’t believe in complications.” If a preamp is fully balanced from input to output, it necessarily has more parts: twice the parts in the signal path. “There is no such thing as a part that has no sound.”

Part of their design philosophy.

- Buck

Buck.......Interesting comment but colloquialism doesn't provide much of a genuine explanation. It can just as easily be said, " No sound system will make music without parts." It takes parts to develop a design philosophy and build a working amplifier. How many parts and how they are effectively implemented to reach the design goal are up to the design engineers and manufacturers. In addition, the working tolerances of individual parts will greatly impact sound quality, as will dozens of other critical aspects of developing a premium audio product. If one design concept was truly so superior to all others, there would be little to no room for others to exist.

If you want an engineering answer maybe you should ask an engineer.

The response was a simplification for the intended audience. I think it was fair enough in the context of an owners forum.

Conrad Johnson's philosophy is fewer parts but better parts and KISS. According to my dealer ( who has made his own amps) all the CJ circuits are about as minimalist as you can make them.

At a high level that makes enough sense for 90% of owners. Ultimately its how the component sounds that is important. The use of teflon caps would have to be another issue. Have you seen the size of them. Twice the parts would mean a much bigger case.

Audio Research have balanced models. I wonder why they don't use Teflon caps.

End of the day its a design choice by CJ. You want CJ thats what you get.

Thanks AG, works for me.

.. not convinced... :scratch2:

"It just sounds right" And so it does for me... tubes and simple circuits with quality parts, hand assembled and tested.

Although I prefer fully balanced components, I have very high regard for CJ gear. A friend of mine has one of their preamps and it has only one 6922 tube. Sounds great. I do wish they did produce fully balanced gear, though.

I always found it interesting that they don't make gear with balanced ins/outs while most other competitors do. I'm curious if any CJ owners have ever had issues with long cable runs and noise that could be overcome by using balanced cables. What I'm not curious about is that B. Conrad and L. Johnson know way more about electrical engineering than I do. :D

- Buck

Never. I run 6m interconnects. had prem 16 and ART, now GAT.

I tested a while back when I had the prem16 with 1m and 6m IC. No difference in sound.