Best Preamp for under $1750.00

everybody knows melos is yunk, unreliable, poor service, etc. yust ask leafs! ;~) but, of all the pre's mentioned here, only the joule electra la 100 mklll wood be of any interest to me, to audition it against my melos music director. i'd be innerested in the cat, but no remote-control wolume makes it a non-starter for me...

doug s.

kasboot, how wood i hook up my turntable, tuna, & cd w/no preamp? and, besides, when it comes to cd, i'd much rather have it go thru a pre then be run straight-in to an amp. my experience was that a great pre leveled the playing field between cd-players from $500 to $3k. and yes, the spendy player (which was *designed* to be run straight-in to an amp) still sounded better thru a pre...

ymmv, doug s.