The good news is that you can find GREAT preamps for very reasonable prices...they just have to be made in China. My dual mono balanced Kavent S33 weighs a ton and is crammed with groovy little parts (no clue what the parts do, but I've taken the top off the thing to gaze fondly at them) assembled beautifully, works perfectly, is quiet, and sounds AMAZING (I made a friend drag his Pass XP10 over and we BOTH thought the Kavent sounded as good or better...sorry Nelson). $1500 or something list, and it looks like a circa 1987 VCR...not sure if that's a bonus. I think "cache'" is a large part of the "audio exotica" costs but if the esthetic rewards are enough, then I say support the "state of the art" if it makes you happy...however, when China makes a car that drives and has the build quality of my BMW for way less money, I'm all over it.
Modern Linestages
This is a general question about how complex and expensive some linestages have become. I'm looking to understand why? I can grasp that really good volume controls are complicated and that equally good switches are not inexpensive. I also have a general understanding of the importance of a high quality power supply, which again is not going to come cheap. I just don't comprehend how you get to a 50lbs. plus preamps that cost well over $20k. Is this level of complexity really needed or is it the equivalent of the spate of 500hp "sedans" for every day driving?