I played around w/o a [preamp for a while (Esoteric K03) but when I added a preamp, my life changed. You really need a good preamp to have incredible midrange, depth and texture, resolution, etc. Try it. Game Changes. I started with an Ayre (sold it for $1650 on here) and moved up to a Jeff Rowland Criterion (got for $10 grand here) and the sound is just plain incredible.
