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My Carver preamp is killing me!
Posted by Jesse Mendoza [IP: 205.219.3.85] on May 27, 1999 at 13:10:39
Using Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 4.0; Windows 95):
Help! I have a peculiar problem that is driving me crazy. Simply put my preamp keeps messing up and losing sound in either the center or rear channels.
This is my situation in a nutshell, a very large one. My system consists of Carver ct26v preamp (prologic), carver 705x 5 channel amplifier, velodyne fsr-18 subwoofer, klipsch speakers (5), sony turntable, harmon kardon cd changer, toshiba tv, toshiba vcr, sony cassette deck, monster cable speaker wire, and monster m550i interconnects. Monster interconnects are present on almost all the connections but I do have a few remaining cheapo interconnects. All plugs lead into a single surge protector, $25 variety. My tv, vcr and preamp are connected to my outside antenna via coaxial cable. All speaker wire is terminated with banana plugs.
1st Preamp Occurrence my preamp;
My preamp experienced intermittent sound drop to the center channel in pro logic mode. Initially the sound would go out every once in a while, eventually almost constantly. This usually happened when changing source. I checked all the cables and even swapped channels on my amplifier to no avail (I checked the center speaker and it worked fine when hooked up to the main out). The preamp seemed to be the source of the problem. So I sent it to get fixed. It arrived weeks later and worked fine for about 3 weeks then the same thing started happening again. I checked and double checked all my connections and disconnected components to see if it alleviated the problem, but it did not. I reluctantly returned it to get fixed and questioned the thoroughness of the repair job. My dealer offered me a loner while mine was getting fixed, same type of preamp.
2nd Preamp Occurrence loaner preamp;
I went home happily with my loaner preamp and it worked fine for about 5 weeks. Yes, I know it has been a long time to wait for a fix on my original, but that is besides the point. I have had a fully functional preamp so I did not miss mine. Well, last night I noticed the rear channels in my set up were not working. I checked all my connections from amp to preamp and amp to speaker, but they were all okay. I checked all the modes on the preamp and they were set correctly. After looking over everything I have come to the conclusion that the preamp is at fault again. Keep in mind this is a different preamp! Uggghhhh!
Solutions or Causes;
What could be causing this to happen?
a.) Could my subwoofer be damaging my preamp? Initially I had my 2 main preamp outputs running to the sub and 2 connections running back to the amp. After the problems with my preamp I hooked up the loaner with a single run from the subwoofer out jack to one of the sub inputs. Could the sub be sending back a signal causing my preamp to have a short?
b.) Could I be receiving a power surge from my antenna connection running back into my preamp and burning out some circuitry?
c.) Could the electrical system in my house be damaging my preamp? My house is rather old 40’s and has some ancient wiring that causes some blinking of lights when my washer operates. Therefore is my surge protector not really protecting anything?
d.) Could my tv, vcr, cd player, turntable or other component cause this to happen? Could any of them be sending back a damaging signal to my preamp?
e.) I am a complete idiot and have forgotten some other minor thing.
f.) Do I need to get a technician to come to my house and check everything out since I can’t narrow down the source of the problem.
g.) I have had the misfortune of having 2 preamps which just happened to develop similar problems. In other words the Carver ct26v is a lemon.
h.) None of the above it could be _____________ (fill in the blank)
Any help in solving my dilemma would be greatly appreciated. I should be getting my preamp back soon and would hate for this to happen again.
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