Agreed as well...I run this type of configuration and am extremely happy with it; I've got the best of both worlds in that the pre-amp I am very happy with is also serving as the baseline of the sound quality for the L/R channels in home theater. As BD and Chad mentioned above, you don't need a pre-amp necessarily with HT pass-through (a unity-gain capable input) but it does make it easy. I run a Classe SSP-600 surround pre/proc and Classe CP-700 2-box pre-amp in this config and it sounds great for home theater. For 2-ch, I then use a non-unity gain (i.e. 'normal') balanced input on the CP-700 for great 2-channel listening and leave the SSP-600 in standby with nothing passing through it for 2-ch.
Mixing a Stereo pre-amp with HT Pre-amp processor
I currently have a McIntosh MX135 Pre/Pro and in the recent visit to the RMAF. I had a mfg rep tell me that if I bought a stereo pre-amp with Passive Pass Thru that I could place it between the MX135 and run the 2 front channels thru the stereo pre-amp. And have my stereo source components run thru the stereo pre-amp and totally bypass the MX135. He said that I would make a big gain in sound quality, I called McIntosh and they told me that I could gain as well, of course they recommended a couple of McIntosh pre-amps that had this capability. My question: Has anyone done this, was it worth it? What PreAmp would you recommend? I was looking at the Ayre K5XE and possibly one of the McIntoshs. Just curious if this would be worth it.