moding and the inexperienced

Unless you are talking about the GFP-750, be wary of expensive upgrades to Adcom preamps. You'll quickly find yourself throwing money at products with limited performance potential and poor resale value. "Reasonably priced" and cottage industry audio modifications don't co-exist in the same universe. If someone has the skills to experiment along these lines without incurring labor charges, fine, go for it. But if you are paying someone to do these mods to a mid or lower level adcom product, you might as well pour money down a hole IMO.

If you do not own a piece of equipment why buy one you have to modify? Usually modified equipment (unless by very well known experts) is worth less, not more than stock items on he used market and one can rarely recover the price of the mods. I suggest that you read a couple of books on circuit design before making any decision. The VTL book and Valve Amplifiers by Morgan Jones are geared to beginners.

I have to agree with Photon , and I will add , unless you have a friend who has had the same mods done to the same piece of equipment , and can give you a first hand view of what to expect , your probably wasting your money .
Some of my friends have had higher end gear upgraded with good results , but it took lots of research and money to get good results and sometimes the gains were marginal at best .

Many people swear by mods but they are not for those just starting out.

I think the best way to get started is find a pair of speakers you like then get an amp that works well with them. Likewise for your source components (cd player, server, turntable), adding one piece at a time.

There are tons of opinions to read on speakers and other components, so if you don't have the opportunity to audition before buying do a lot of reading first.

After you've put together a system you are very happy with, then it's time to consider mods to squeeze a little more performance out.

Well said Tomcy, that's why the mods are for.

And many people swear AT mods. :)

pS. I wouldn't spend allot of money trying upgrade an adcom preamp- it's allot like spending to upgrade a Chevy Vega. :)

I completely agree with all the above 95%... Any Adcom other than the GFP750 will never be made significantly better to the point of being worth the money for future resale... On the other hand. If you have some nice parts laying around and in general like the Adcom. A polystyrene or teflon bypass or replacing a cheap electrolytic with a poly cap or such with the same value, will make a difference. Minimal investment and an audible return. Outside of that, I would recommend to sell the Adcom, add the money you were going to spend on the mod and upgrade your preamp.