Preamps waste of money?

I have an Autoformer Tap X and an Lightspeed Attenuator. I would consider both the antithesis of "colored".

Tmsorosk, I would gave to disagree. When I installed the goldpoint attenuators, the sound became more full with increased harmonic detail and dynamics. It wasn't warm in the classical tube sense, but there was less tilting of the sound toward brightness. This is antithesis of what I hear with SS. I play classical guitar, and some of my classical guitar recordings tend to bright and hard, closer to steel string guitar rather than the creamy full sound of nylon strings. Most probably wouldn't notice this coloration unless you play acoustic guitar. Now these recordings actually sound like the real thing, the most neutral sound I've gotten from my system.

Grannyring, my bad. It's hard to interpret the intent of some posts. I enjoyed reading your Dude thread.

Devilboy, we have similar experience with these passives. I have to admit though in my system the stepped attenuator in the input of the amp was hands down better than the external passives.

I've just been through this process myself. I'm a great fan of TVC passives as they really provide a detailed uncoloured sound for a relatively small amount of money. I've used a SAC TVC, briefly used a Music First Mk II and recently a StereoKnight Silverstone B&R. The choice seems to be between detail or energy until you reach a particular quality point. Unfortunately my experience is that this is quite expensive. I finally have found the detail that I have had from the StereoKnight or Music First but with the power and control of an active. It has cost me though.