How much do I need to spend to get a preamp that sounds better than no preamp?

Been my experience that all components have a certain "burn in" period. 

It's been a long time, but I remember even swapping cables, there is still an amount of time that it keeps improving, even though it may have been burned in before.

Not that I know anything about the Hatter, but I might ask where is the line we draw for the definition of "passive". 

After all, even a volume control is a resister, and thus, buffered in a sense (I know that's not buffered). Components besides thinking of it as just straight nothing. 

We have interconnect cables we plug in, or have batteries. But we don't consider them active. 

kosst

His site can be confusing

He offers straight passive as I have, also tube buffered and integrated