Looking for a simple but exquisite front end

No romance you need the Atom he which has balanced outputs none of the other units have a balanced output 

The Atom he = headphone edition

I have a regular Atom… has been excellent for 6 years but recently bricked and service for North America goes to Canada… slow but works… eventually.

the Atom he also has functionality the OP might not need, so consider preamp / streamers..of which there are a bunch….

I’m in the market for a pre-amp/DAC (don’t need internal streamer, but fine if it doesn’t harm the unit or price) and there’s a nice crop of devices out now, some from new orgs (Ferum, new b2c, was an OEM only shop) some from longer standing brands: (T+A, Sim/Moon), in reverse order:

1. https:// simaudio.com/en/product-category/preamplifiers/
   1. my budget drives the 390, I heard it locally and setting up an in-home trial shortly. The 791 seems well regarded short of their "north" high line...
2. https:// www.ta-hifi.de/en/audiosystems/series-200/dac-200-d-a-converter/
   1. i’d get it with the HDMI board, this pushes my budget limit, so it’s the upper limit for me, personally
3. https:// ferrum.audio/wandla-hypsos/
   1. the external power supply is more than filter and rectifieer, the variable voltage combined with DAC filter tuning looks interesting

Each of these is worth reading about, thankfully I have 2 dealers which carry all 3 between them near me. I will be doing a head to head on the first 2 in my system. Seeing if I can do the same with the Wandla... but haven’t secured that yet.

They seem to all provide a good value (all relative) each with special strengths outside the normal marques you may know.

happy listening.

edit: PS: i run XLR out to my Buckeye amps, andall 3 of these suggestions have XLR outs but also have RCA outputs - which I will use for my dual subs (HSU’s) - thought you might want to add 4 analog outputs (variable gain, not just fixed level line/tape out) to your feature list for potential subs in your future to supplement your towers...

I have been using a Moon 390 with a Moon 330 Amp to drive Magnapan 1.7i’s for about 2 1/2 years. Very pleased with sound and flexibility of 390 ( I still have my TT, CD player and Cassette deck from decades past).  

@h4k4lugi 

Your Buckeye amps may not sit well with the OP @hailtothevictorz