Well today is your lucky day, I owned all the pieces in your examples.. #1 SFL-1 was my least favorite tube preamp. I say look elsewhere, yes there are some newer units from small U.S. manufactures and other used units that are better in my opinion.. The mcCormack, good amp, solid state sound, not bad on the used market for 600 or so. Odyssey, is a better amp with higher quality parts from my experiance, sound is somewhat similar depending on what you feed it with preamp wise.. However WAY more power and control from the Odyssey. It is a super solid design, build quality is as simple and hiend as it gets realistically. But truth is a new Odyssey is still double the price of a used mcCormack so its a toss up. Try a used McCormack for cheap, and buy an odyssey on the 30 day trial, decide for yourself.. Worst case you either return the odyssey with a loss in shiping, or you sell the mcCormack for the same you paid. By the way, none of these or newer stuff has much of a Newer technology, but with a newer piece you will get more than likely better capacitors made today then were made 10 years ago, and they will last longer, but this is another thing that goes back to the odyssey thing, you will get a full 20 year warranty anyway.
So at the 1000.00 dollar mark, there are very good new items as are used.. At higher prices at lets say 2 k plus you then start to set apart New vs. Better stuff used. Specifically pertaining to the odyssey's, they are as good and use just as quality of parts as any Levinson, Pass, Krell etc.. In the 5 to 6 k range anyway.. They are the best A-B amp values today. You can find many reviews on all 3 of these items in the hundreds.
So at the 1000.00 dollar mark, there are very good new items as are used.. At higher prices at lets say 2 k plus you then start to set apart New vs. Better stuff used. Specifically pertaining to the odyssey's, they are as good and use just as quality of parts as any Levinson, Pass, Krell etc.. In the 5 to 6 k range anyway.. They are the best A-B amp values today. You can find many reviews on all 3 of these items in the hundreds.