Eq'ing on the way in is a personal decision. I would say that most of your "big boys" do EQ on the way in. Especially if they plan on mixing in the box down the road. Even the best of plugins still don't sound much better than mediocre analog EQ's on many ways. I am not referring to surgical cuts and stuff, but to overall musicality and smoothness. There are two big reasons I can see to NOT EQ on the way in though. First, if you don't have a lot of experience or a full vision of what is to come down the road in that particular song. Second is something Harvey mentioned the other day. If you are going to have vocalists coming back to rerecord certain spots. Having a channel be flat makes it much easier to match up the signal chain later, even though in the end having the voclist perform in a consistent fashion will be one of the hardest things to match up.
As far as EQ'ing on the way in goes, I do it whenever necessary, without hesitation. What I am always leary of is any heavy EQ'ing on the way in. If a track needs to be heavily EQ'ed it is because there is a problem with either the source signal, the mic, the placement, or even the preamp. Mic placement is certainly what you should try before just blindly EQ'ing, but mic placement and even mic selection won't solve all things. Sometimes you get a great sound out of a specific mic or placement, but there can still be a few things that you would like differently. Moving the mic or even changing mics may solve some of those problems, but in turn create problems where there weren't problems before. This is where EQ comes in wonderfully. Especially good EQ's. If a track is hit with some tasteful EQ no one will ever know that you did that. They will only here a solid pleasing result.
I would reccomend to everyone to not be afraid of EQ, but treat it like everything else in the recording chain. Learn what the EQ's you have do well and don't do well. They are tools that can be just as damaging as they are helpful if misused. They are just like everything else in your chain in that sense. If you are uncomfortable with the thought of EQ'ing on the way in, don't do it. If however come mixdown you are EQ'ing fairly heavily, maybe you need some different equipment, better technique, and more EQ skills. I still think that adding 3 db of 120hz on the way in and another 3db at mix sounds more natural than having to add 6 db all at once. That was just some random numbers with no reasoning behind the actual numbers, but just an example to prove my own personal opinion. I like the sound of two small boosts and cuts better than one big one.
