Volume level of ARC Ref 5 seems very high

«The Mesa worked best with low gain and the Rothwell 10db did the job without noticible side effects» Yes, with no apparent damage. This is no serious hi-fi. Is a passive fixed pré. Two pré in the same signal line...

160562. HUH?

Not serious Hifi? Pray tell what exactly is 'serious HiFi'?

Two pre's - BS. The Rothwell is a simple resistor put in the signal path with lots of others. Nothing more or less.

You sound like someone advocating spending mucho bucks to solve, what for many would be, an adequate and inexpensive fix.

Newbee, there is no simple answer. For example, in my situation I would prefer a unity gain i.e. 0 gain remote controlled device as my audio and video system are one in the same and I can't use my ARC SP3C. I refuse to get up to change the gain or mute the preamp every time I change channels. I don't feel like building one either.

«You sound like someone advocating spending mucho bucks to solve, what for many would be, an adequate and inexpensive fix.»
You're putting a simple resistance between two devices of 10K , connected by a cable of 2K? perhaps, to solve a problem of incompatibility of gains. It's one more? But all the others do not obey to projects? and very expensives. Considering the investment, is not a serious way to solve the problem. There are some preamplifiers, which have entries with different gains, for digital and analogue, or a switch, to change the gain. This is to face the problem seriously. This makes part of the project. I think 'Amused' was thinking that spending a certain amount of money, everything would be perfect. he deserves your comment, not me.

Doggiehowser, I'm looking forward to your impressions of the attenuators...