Your critique of ARC LS28SE/Rogue RP-9 welcome if offered.
@hickamore ARC has never supported AES48. So that means to get the most out of them you have to audition cables and be careful about ground loops. This isn't any different from using a single-ended preamp. I'm not sure of the Rogue, but it appears to have single-ended outputs in tandem with the balanced outputs and there's no switch involved so this suggests that it does not support the standard either. In both cases this says nothing about the 'sound' of the preamp, just that you have to be careful about cables and ground loops, neither of which should be a thing with balance operation.
FWIW remote and silver front panels are available for our MP-3.