Tone Deft wrote:
Some of us have been living in apartments for decades.

But there's no fucking way I'm moving to the 'burbs even if it means loudness. This weekend I've been playing/recording/tweaking until 5 in the morning, no complaints, no interruptions.
i guess i'm lucky in that i have deaf neighbors, or apathetic/passively supportive ones to say the least. most of my reamping is done with a 10watt 1960's magnatone or a 60watt Sunn 200s bass amp on "2" in my apartment at 4am it even helps just to have a speaker moving some air. You may be interested in trying one of zvex's 1watt amps or emery sound's 5watt recording amps or an old valco or magnatone tube amp.
as for the universal audio stuff, the 2-610 is an amazing, quite colored mic pre, i wouldn't compare it to an avalon at all. It's a classic. maybe their new solid state pre (the other "solo" lunchbox mic pre) is supposed to be quite transparent. i haven't heard the "solo" 610 yet, but have my eyes on one, if it's as good as one channel of the 2-610, i might be sold. It's going to cost much more than a bluetube or 4 channels of crappy pres, universal is quality stuff, not quite neve or api, but well above presonus, dbx, meek, etc.