What to do with broken McIntosh Pre-Amp

Hi Hoopie
The smoke you saw, and maybe heard a fizzy sound, was a capacitor burning out. Easy fix!  Not $800.00  (unless you want it to be) Find an shop that does repairs. They can replace the  capacitor for less than $200. They should be able to replace all of the caps for less than $400. My electronics repair shop  replaces all caps on a amplifier for $350.  These aren’t the super high end caps but they sound fantastic.  They work with Macs on a regular basis!  You should easily be able to find somebody in New York that can work on a Mac.

 Bent

Oops. Pittsburgh. My apologies It’s the same answer though!
Bent 

michaellent:  thanks, I think the switcher is the answer for now.  It’s good to know the problem and potential cost to fix.  I really appreciate your input.

fasteddie:  You expressed my dilemma perfectly. I’m not an audiophile, but I have heirloom audiophile equipment.  It just feels wrong to sell it.  And that’s why I found this group and posted my question.  Thank you.

Mrdecibel:  well, I hope you got a kick out of my response to your “sources” question!  Pittsburgh, ha ha ha ha.  It reveals how out of my element I am and why “Hoopie” is my handle.  Thanks for your help.  Enjoy your day!

No it makes No sence a fixed Mcintosh preamp is much better quality then any piece of junk for $750 please remember when you buy anything new roughly 25% or less actually goes into the item the rest a R&D overhead and markup.
that piece you have would sell for $3-4K  new it may cost $5-600 to fix 
send it in and get a written estimate .  In the mean time with Khorns 
you can run any thing on them while you are waiting they are very efficient.
I was at a demonstration where a Paul Klipsch hooked up a 9 v pocket radio 
up to a K horn around 1980 and was very loud  at maybe 1 watt.grest Classic a Loudspeaker.