Welcome.
Those Aerial Acoustics look pretty sweet.
Years ago, coming out of a almost non audio funk, I bought a Rotel 2.1 receiver. It wasn't particularly cheap but sounded like it and was built like it. The power button came off after a few years and it (thankfully) died shortly after the warrantee expired. FM reception was poor, and it had a thick dark sound. Used Harmon Kardon 2 channel and cheap Sony 6.1 channel receivers at 1/4th the price that I also owned at the time performed and sounded much better. Maybe it was a lemon or maybe the product was a dud. But there's too many other options for me to try mid-fi Rotel again.
I'd try posting an pre-amp question to the tube circle. I agree, good sounding/quiet tube pre-amps aren't cheap (and either are 6sn7 tubes). Another option would be trying a tubed DAC/pre-amp that would allow you to get into ripping your music.
