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good question....same question can apply to receivers I guess.
I have been told that my Sherwood/Newcastle P-965 sounds better than more expensive pre/pros.....and it definitely sounds better than my HK 525.
Why one costs more than the other probably has more to do with marketing and image.
-curtis
Curtis,
Have you written a review of the 965? On paper, it's a great value.
David
Nope...I haven't.
I will say it is a great value. Lower noise floor, and there seems to be more depth and detail as well. DD and DTS sound great.
DPL2X is pretty nice. I wish I had a bigger room to take better advantage of it.
If the promised firmware updates come out, this thing is a downright steal.
-curtis
Looks like quite a pre/pro you have Curtis. I've never seen a Sherwood.
To semi-reply to the opening question, it's better to think of most pre-amps as being processors--they're taking a digital signal (for home theater, certainly) and converting it to sound. How well they do what you ask (sound like they're not there) is where the cost comes from.
For 2-channel audio, or even 5.1 channel DVD-A/SACD, the player may be doing the processing, and in those cases a simpler pre-amp that doesn't do processing would be more what you mention, "a straight wire from source to amp". Cost from there is more a matter of build quality and marketing...
As a fun little test, if you have the equipment for it, take a CD, put it in a DVD player with 5.1 outputs, then switch back and forth between the digital and analog inputs for the DVD player on your receiver/pre-amp. With my old setup, despite both parts being Denon, there was a pretty large difference in the processing, which was easily heard when playing CDs. Letting the DVD player do the digital-analog conversion resulted in a warmer sound but less of a soundstage. Depending on the CD, I switched around a fair bit.
I now have a Sherwood Newcastle P-965, replacing the Denon 4802r. Ditto to everything Curtis says, it's a very, very good sounding pre-amp. I have it paired with an Outlaw 770 amp, and the sound for movies and CDs is just beautiful.
I just ordered the first two components of my HT, an Anthem AVM30
pre-pro and an Integra Research universal player. These will be
paired with an ATI 200w x7 amp, and (of course) Ascend speakers
(340's across the front and 170's across the rear for a 7.1 system).
I'll update y'all when I hook it all up and give it a listen!
Rick
Rick!! Very nice!! I might have to drive inland to visit you.
-curtis