Hello Stewart
Before i try to answer both your questions,let me tell you something.Whenever i heard a cd player(be it a stand alone one or a transport/dac one)tha has its own volume control ,
passing the signal through pre-amp "robs" something from its sound.Anyway,to answer your questions....
1) yes,it is true you will get more bloom through the right pre-amp !
2) Hmmmmm that's a tricky one.All the pre-amps you mention verge on the analytical/cool side of things or to put things right,none will give you the bloom you seek. I would suggest something like a Joule Electra LA-150 mk2.let me know what you think.

Hello again Stewart. I used a Nagra PL-P with my dCS stack (mainly because I had a record deck in the system and couldn't be bothered to switch cables all the time) which gave a sound that was certainly not overly dry to my ears, but my downstream components were different so YMMV. Adding the preamp may have robbed the system of that last ounce of transparency but the tonal balance was certainly neutral to my ears and nothing I would have described as dry.

While a preamp erring on the lusher side (read through the reviews in the archives, Jonathan Scull always gave helpful pointers for system matching in his reviews) may be the tonic you are looking for, don't forget cables. In my experience they can be a good way to 'season' the final sound quality dish. An in-depth chat with a dealer with real experience of your components could be time well invested, and/or an email or call to the dCS's US distributor or possibly even dCS themselves. In my experience all the aforementioned were extremely knowledgeable and more than willing to help with this type of query.

Good luck!