AvFan:

(My intention here isn't to get into a conflict, but just to play devil's advocate. )

You raise two good points. However, those situations tend to be unusual and can be addressed in other ways. If pre/pro vendors think that phono preamp usage is rare enough that they can acceptably omit a phono input on their hardware (and, even though I'm a vinyl guy, I think this is a reasonable omission), then the two situations you describe should also fall into the "so rarely encountered we can ignore them" category.

Nonetheless, for purely marketing reasons (which the CE industry/fanbase has tacitly forced vendors into) we all have to pay extra for those seldom needed connectors.