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Newbie Question

dieseldust27

dieseldust27

New Member
So my father has given me his Pioneer C-77 preamp and I want to hook it up with my SA8800 Integrated Amp. My question is, is this setup redundant considering that the SA8800 [non-fluoroscan unit] has already a volume, tone, treble and bass control?
 
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You may, depending on your speakers, notice a slight sonic improvement. Generally speaking separates sound better than receivers or an integrated.

I'm not familiar with either piece but it can't hurt to try it provided the you can separate the power and the pre amp in the integrated and it also has a main in.
 
The word "integrated" in "integrated amp" means that it includes both a preamplifier and a power amplifier in one unit.

So, yes, it's redundant, you don't need both.

However, some high quality integrateds have the capability of taking the input from a different preamp, and/or providing an output for the preamp that's part of the integrated. In that case, the outboard preamp doesn't go through the preamp stage of the integrated. If your 8800 doesn't have that capability (I'm not personally familiar with it), then you can't just hook up your preamp to an "Aux" input, for example, because the Aux goes to the integrated's preamp stage, so you'd be "double pre-amping" it.:no:

That is nice gear, though!
 
Use both, use conservative tone settings and observe proper gain structure (conservative, preamp doing the majority of voluming) and just let your ear tell you where to stop. I do this with my bass rig. I have a small Ampeg B1-RE I use with a Tech 21 RBI preamp. The Ampeg volume is set 1/4 gain, 1/2 master, slight bump on bass, pre set at 1/3 gain, 2/3 master, bump on bass and cut on mid and treble, Sounds great with tone adjusted on instrument, and I also use reverb and BBE sonic maximizer. As far as "needing", I always consider how I want something to sound, within reasonable, conservative settings, before settling for "needs"-based reasoning. Reminds me of my father asking me, "Do you really NEED all that stuff?" Same diff. Let your ears tell you where to draw the line. Don't go overboard...
 
Bet you'd be much better off just using the built-in preamp in the 8800 rather than 'doubling-up' on preamplification........Does the 8800 have main-in's? If so, than you'd likely be better of using the separate pre with the 8800....

I once tried using an external tube pre with an integrated that had no main-in's,, and it simply wasn't right...you don't need that much line level gain
 
If your integrated amp has "main in" inputs on the back, go ahead and connect the preamp to that. You then would connect all your sources to the preamp. The controls on the integrated will be useless, aside from the power and speaker switches

If your integrated doesn't have that "main in" feature, then don't bother running the preamp to a line-level (or phono) input on your integrated.

You won't gain anything by feeding the signal through two preamp stages. in fact, you'll just compound the faults of both.
 
I guess I'll just have to scrap this idea because my 8800 doesn't have a Main In input, only Pre Out lol. I don't want to use the AUX input...thank you guys for your responses!
 
The Pioneer SA8800 should have "MAIN-IN" jacks, right next to the "PRE-OUT" jacks, so your idea should work!

Your "pre-out/main-in" jacks are the two sets just to the right of all the inputs with the jumpers in them. Just remove the jumpers and connect your preamp to the "MAIN AMP" input jacks!

SA8800r.jpg


If you say your amp does not contain MAIN IN jacks, then this post is null & void and you may own a very unusual (possible european) version.
 
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