Bob Backert works hard on every aspect of our preamps. One example is the fact that, unlike other brands, our Home Theater Bypass inputs do not “use up” your tubes while you are watching movies.
Those who have a home theater mixed in with their high-quality stereo systems usually run into a problem: those big front speakers are fed by a power amp, which is fed by their home theater processor, during movies…. and it’s fed by their 2-channel preamp when they listen to music. But nobody wants to go behind their power amp every time they switch from movies to music, to change the cables that feed the power amp.
The Home Theater input jacks on many preamps, including Backert Labs linestage preamps, solve this.
A pair of RCA jacks on the rear panel of every Backert Labs linestage (called “Home Theater”) receives interconnect cables from the front left/right preamp outputs of your home theater receiver. The problem with many other brands is that they require you to leave the preamp ON while it’s acting as a bypass to let you watch movies.
However with Bob Backert’s design, simply turning off your Backert Labs preamp turns it into a bypass (no matter which input the Backert’s Source selector knob is pointing to), so that your power amp now receives sound signals from your home theater processor. Since you activate Home Theater mode by turning your Backert Labs preamp off, you won’t be using up the Backert’s preamp tubes while you watch movies.
Home Theater mode works whether your Backert Labs is connected to your power amp via RCA, or fully balanced XLR connectors. In fact, if you are using both XLR and RCA outputs to connect to multiple power amps or subs, both outputs will receive signal.
As you can see in the photo, each Backert Labs linestage comes with shorting pins plugged into the Home Theater input pair, so that when they are not being used, the preamp does not pick up any external noise or generate any unwanted artifacts.