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TL;DW

Why do you need a preamp pedal?
Because I just made one and I want you to buy it, and David Evans used one once, but mostly you need one because I want your money.

I'm all for boosts, graphic equalisers, and a bit of dirt in front of an amp, so the preamp makes sense. It's just about shaping the sound.

Ask Keith

My take on boost pedals - the first half of V1 is normally wired as a gainless clean input buffer. But with a big boost hitting V1 you can hit that first valve stage hard enough for it to compress or even dirt up.

With the first half of V1 now contributing to the "gainyness" of the tone you can run the later sections of the amp at a lower gain level, spreading the overall gain over one more stage for a hopefully better sound.

Course now im back to digital (Amplifire3) i just use my studio monitors now, zero valves

p.s most powerful boost i have encountered is the Klon - they run internally on 27 volts ( use both voltage doubling and inverting for +18v hot and -9v ground) resulting in a huge available output level.