Mid-Hi fi Phono preamp w/ volume control?


I am looking for a low priced (<$500 new or used) preamp with a phono stage or a phono preamp with a volume control. I currently have an old Dual belt drive with a Grado Red Cartridge, that I play through an old reciever in the basement, but I will be purchasing an AR ES-1 w/ Merril mods and a Clearaudio MM when a friend gets married.

This will be going thru the 2 ch bypass of a Sony TAP-9000 ES multichannel preamp, an Adcom 7500 power amp (next to go), and Dynaudio 1.8 mk II's.

I'm sold on SACD, even with the limited software, but I have too much vinyl(~700) that will never see high rez digital, or that the original CD sounds like garbage.

Thanks for any advice,

Jim
jpharris
I had an Antique Sound Lab Phono preamp tube unit that had volume controls for each channel. It was very good - I do not remember the model number but they perhaps have something similar but the EAR is a hard one to beat.
Thanks for the info. I have heard the full featured unit, I think it was EAR 864?? and loved it, but it was too pricey for what I wanted. I will look into the 834 models with volume control. I agree that it doesn't fit the mid fi description, but I could suffer the indignity of better quality if I had to.

Thanks
Yes there is no mistake on that one:
order it directly from www.stoneaudio.co.uk for <$600 with the shipping VS $895 price in US.
EAR 834 doesn't look and sound like mid-fi. It's rather true high-end device. It's quite a work for now to get it under $500.
Brittish pound drops down for now(thanks to EURO!) and ordering directly from England will save you a couple...