bluebird-
in regards to something being "wrong" with scotts arrangement, you'd really need to check the spec of whatever input transformer you were planning on using when making a decision on where to put a pad. I can respect scott's idea, but that circuit as is provides sooo much distortion that I dont feel I need more from the input transformer, but thats just me, the circuit does sound good for that kind of thing. But that decision really depends on what kind of headroom your input transformers have and what kind of level your microhpones put out. I for instance cant use a 10468 input without a pad with most of my mics on any kind of drum or guitar cab. If you have high output tube mics, you arent talking about cool harmonics but a square wave in some cases, so having a pad BEFORE the transformer can, in certain scenarios, mean the difference between the pre being usable or not long before it becomes a question of taste on saturation. Some transformers are like the sound sponge that just seem to absorb whatever level you throw at them, while others sound awesome until they poop out and when youve reached the max level, you definitely DEFINITELY know it and having a pad on the secondary isnt gonna help too much if at all in those cases. But again, thats really dependant on the output of the mic and the source you have the mic on. You could always put the pad on the secondary and then use an inline pad built into a barrel connector or something for those circumstances when you need it if you like the idea of trying to get as much color as possible out of the input transformer. On a rock and roll session, until I get to vocals I have to pad almost everything...
dave