Operation Guide for Active Remote Volume Control

Placette pre-amps are designed to remain powered up at all times so they do not have a power on/off switch. If your unit has a key lock on the rear panel, this key will disable the control system, making the unit inoperable while at the same time allowing the electronics to remain on.

The left and right channels are totally independent of each other and so the input jacks can be located on opposite sides of the chassis as the internal components are.

All of the I/O jacks used are durable, high quality parts that can be cleaned often without damage. It's a good idea to do this once a month or so.

The banana jacks on the rear panel go directly to the star-ground point in the pre-amp and are available for use with the phono components, if needed. The nearby chassis/lift switch is usually left in the lift position.

The volume is controlled by a microprocessor unit that selects various configurations of Vishay's S-102 resistors. It is operated by the 3-way switch on the front panel or with the remote control. The remote control will step up or down slowly for a few steps and then speed up. The full range of the volume control is 126 repeatable steps. These are enough steps to make the operation less like a stepped attenuator (which it is) and more like the gradual up and down of a conventional control. The MSB indicator on the panel only indicates that the volume control is halfway up and is only a warning about possible high outputs. The volume indication with the 7 LED's on the front panel is in a binary number. As a rough guide of the relative volume level just go by the highest LED that is lit and ignore the ones below it.

The buffered pre-amp have a headphone jack on the front panel. When this jack senses the presence of a headphone plug, it will switch the main outputs off and direct the output of the class-A buffers to the headphones. These buffers are actually small class-A power amps and are probably the best headphone amps available today so an investment on high quality headphones is worthwhile. Later models use the remote to enable headphone operation.

The record mode is necessary as these units do not use a record-out buffer because these buffers can interfere with the normal line signals. In order to record one of the 5 source inputs, select REC on the remote. The LED on the front panel will come on and the line signal will be sent to the record out jack. To play a tape machine, select the play button on the remote. This will disconnect the source and connect the tape player. To monitor a tape while taping, select both REC and PLAY.

Although the Vishay's S102 resistors used in this unit will have exceptional and sparking clarity when new, they will also improve gradually over the first few days of use. This improvement then seems to continue over the years. Break-in can be helped along by playing headphones for the first few days using a high quality source when the system is not otherwise being used.

Please call 1-208-863-1089 anytime if you have a problems or questions regarding the installation of operation of the unit.
Enjoy!