Does remote control degrade the sound of tube preamps?

Motorized Alps RK50 like in my VAC Master - no. Motorized stepped attenuator like in the old Rogue Hera / Athena - no, but it was klunky to use as the control sucked. Digital volume controls like in the ARC Reference, there’s no additional penalty in the remote control ability. Many tube amps will use the motorized Alps RK27 pot out of convenience and cost considerations. There’s no additional penalty over the non-motorized RK27 but that pot is NOT the most transparent part; you can definitely hear the improvement with a better pot or stepped attenuator.

Really good motorized analog controls are expensive, hence the prevalence of digital controls these days.

@emergingsoul

Different use cases. I use a VAC Master preamp in a system with one source (phono stage) that is 2ch only. There’s no need for remote input switching here. Ideally, I don’t want to pay for all those extra inputs. And I absolutely hate the HT Bypass, which I’ve engaged by accident a couple times now (it’s next to and looks like the power knob with no LED indicator) to my MASSIVE displeasure, until I figured out what was wrong. Remote has Mute & Volume Up / Down, which is all I need and want, other than a "Mono" function which this preamp doesn’t have.

It’s hard enough to serve the already narrow market for a $30K preamp, then have to subdivide it further between the pure 2ch guys and family entertainment guys. VAC made what they thought was the best compromise to serve both sets of customers, without sacrificing ultimate 2ch performance.

I can suggest that the ARC Reference preamps are excellent, and provide a full-function remote.