With your budget, I'd get the Don Sachs ($3000) custom built version of the VTA SP14 preamp ($1600). They're both the exact same preamp, but the VTA looks like a home-brew kit. It is available as a kit and if you feel you'd enjoy the satisfaction of actually building something, that's even less at $1200.
VTA has a monoblock amp pair at 120 watts each, for $3000 fully assembled and tested. Building the kit version gives you the satisfaction of having built it yourself and saves you a $1000 as well.
