Upgrading preamp. Best for under $1K

I wouldn’t say ’it’s easy’ to get a great preamp under a grand, however, I’ve had that challenge before and it can be a lot of fun. There’s a lot of very very good stuff, especially vintage stuff, that you can really enjoy chasing down. Make sure to get good, competitive pricing on whatever you choose so that if it doesn’t work out you can at least get your money back- or most of it, moving it along so the next guy who needs $1,000 preamp.

And if I could add, when you're dealing with that kind of budget, I myself would keep it solid state because it'll be a lot easier to get something that works right out of the box now and going forward without having to dik around with tubes, which are lovely, but it's all a crapshoot without really good tubes.

Ps, I wasn't going to suggest one particular preamp because there are a lot of good ones in the world of vintage gear. That said, for a little more than the grand, I recommend a Krell KRC 3 which can probably be had for $1,200 at this point in time. For 1,200, you'll be living with a fine preamp that sounds better than some $5,000/$6,000 preamps I've had- and it has a remote.