preamps cancelling eachother out

[Foo-bu]

i've never worked with rack preamps but i was wondering...

if you use rack preamps and then go to your mixer (which has preamps) wouldnt the mixers preamps just naturally cancel out the rack gear? or wouldnt it at least change the signal so that it isnt just the rack pre you're hearing?

 

[AlChuck]

Huh?

Cancel out?

It would certainly affect the sound in some way, more or less depending on how transparent the mixer's pres are... Most mixers also have a line level input that doesn't have any preamplification in the circuit... but when it comes down to it, anything you run the signal through will alter it or degrade it to some degree. The shorter you can make the signal chain (fewer devices, that is), the less affected your signal will be.

 

[Innovations]

Cancel out? No. Isn't just the rack preamp? Yes.

When it comes to the strict purpose of a preamp, to boost the mic signal to line level, then you obviously need only one, and two would be redundant. Of course nobody would be gushing about how important it is to have the right preamp if all they were looking for was a boost in signal strength.