I’ve had various combinations of pre/power amplification over the years and I’ve never personally settled on which had the more dominant effect on the overall sound of the system. I’ve sort of got myself in the place that the pre has a larger effect and power is power, but am I wrong?
I don’t know because I got rid of my analog preamp a long time ago. It’s really unnecessary in an all digital system. Digital volume controls in modern DACs are extremely transparent, assuming the system is gain matched.