Acoustic treatment? Have you tried sitting on the floor?

It's a fact. It does work, although had some strange looks from the shop manager.

Equal rights for Lentils...

Any preamp will drive any active speaker. It is the same as a preamp driving a power amp.

Yes, that's always been my take on the preamp thing. Never realised that there was a preamp that had more power as has been suggested by teejuk.

There isn't.

Going back to the original question, I always sit on the floor when listening seriously.  It makes a bigs difference to the detail I can hear in the music.

There is a sofa some way behind me, and one on my left, and the wall to my right has a fireplace, so reflections from it will be broken up. I reckon that when I am on the floor I am getting few side reflections, and since I am further from the ceiling, less reflections from that too.  Whatever, it makes a great difference.

Oddly, for reasons I cannot understand, a cushion behind my head always makes the sound duller.  I hear better with my head in free space.

Andrew

A preamp may introduce some gain; a passive preamp will only attenuate the incoming signal, so it will be at a lower level than that coming from, say, a CD player.

There are preamps with active circuitry used with studio monitors apparently, i didn't really think about it in depth but there are active and passive monitor controllers. I got the info from a tech guy at PMTOnline initially; in pro audio it's generally held that you don't connect an amplified output to an amplified speaker, it will blow it but as said preamps on hifi amps are line level which is why i was checking. 

One thing you can do to improve the the audio is pull the speakers away from the wall. Speaker placement is paramount in studios and it does have an impact on hifi just the same. Things standing waves, peaks and nulls etc all affect the sound travelling to your ears. You can have a standing wave from bass build up where you sit and just moving your head forward or back a few inches can have a dramatic effect on the sound. The trick is to have the sweet spot where you listen. 

Treating the rear wall is a good idea if you can do it, making your own traps is pretty easy there are plenty of vids on tutorials on the web. The hard part is sourcing the mineral wool as suppliers mostly deal with trade and have minimum orders but i recommend knauf ecose as there are health concerns with carcinogenics in rockwool. Or you can by them premade but they can be quite expensive.

Every time I see this thread title I hear in my head the sample from a Kid Koala album

"Tell me, has it ever occurred to you folks why hi-fi addicts always sit on the floor barefoot?"

Thanks Andrew, a current example of each would be?

I have made a half decent panel trap for the rear wall as a 'temporary' fitting. Either mirror or panel can be hung on the wall. I made the panel very light but the mirror weighs a ton. Glad to see several room treatmentees here.