Personal Preamp Evolution

Advent 300 Receiver using preamp section (wow)

Apt Holman (read all the hype and fell for it)

Back to Advent 300 Receiver (it sounded better)

PS Audio 6.1 passive preamp (big improvement but still not there yet)

Conrad Johnson PV 12AL (Now that's music happy at last!)

1980 Audible Illusions mini-mite
1982 Audible Illusions (new model of what was really the mini-mite)
1983 Yamaha C2
1984 PS Audio (concurrent with C2 and tubed pres)
1985 Superphon (ditto)
1989 Forte (Great harmonics, detail filter)
1992 Van Alstine Pas 4
1999 Onkyo P-304 (ridiculously good for the money, got it new for $129...MSR was $600)
2000 Threshold NS-10 ($30 at pawn shop, blown power caps. $10.59 to fix. Great pre,especially when put on the lab power-supply.)
2003 Bryston BP25, 1.5 phono (ultra-quiet and better musicality than all the tubes I put it against YMMV. Not the last word in high-freq dynamics.)
2003 Spectral DMC30S (Oh yeah, baby! Dynamics,extention, mids...pretty much everything.)
2003 Using the built-in preamp on the 390S (Awesome with right cables...and nothing else to switch. Will take in other digital sources though.)

Belles DM Preamp, ANYTHING?

I started in 1974. Alphabetically:

Audio Research SP-3
Audio Research SP-4
Harman Kardon Citation 25
Heathkit AP-1800
McIntosh C28
SAE Mk XXX (I actually had 2 of these)
SAE Mk 1B
Yamaha C-85

I still have both the Audio Research units.

I was an integrated guy up till 2000. Since then:

2000: SimAudio P-3
2003(May): SimAudio P-5
2003 (October): Bent Audio NOH (Transformer passive - the proverbial "curly wire with attenuation")