I own a Freya and love the fact that it uses 6SN7 tubes that can be "rolled" to your listening pleasure. Bought it when the Freya 1st came out. I use the Tubes Mode most of the time, but it is really good to have the Passive, or JFET modes as well to play the same songs and hear the differences between them. The Passive Mode is very transparent and I have found some days that I would have a Passive Mode listening session and enjoy it just as much as I would in Tube Mode. The JFET Mode adds a hair more body than the Passive Mode, but is a great experience as well. I also had been using a Schiit Modi Multi-Bit for a year and then upgraded to a Audio Alchemy DDP-1 that has a DAC and Preamp both in one unit, and a external power supply that is very robust, to say the least. So I went straight from my Audio Alchemy DDP-1 to my Krell KSA-200S amplifier and with some really good cabling the sound was improved an order of a magnitude. I also use a Singxer SU-1 USB Bridge connected thru AES/EBU going into the Audio Alchemy DDP-1.
So I had an idea.... I had read one of the friends of the Schiit Company had used the Freya in a way that was kind of different. So I thought to myself that I would try to send my XLRs out of the Audio Alchemy DDP-1 to the Freya, and then out the Freya to the Krell amp. Figured that I could use the DAC on the Audio Alchemy DDP-1 and the Freya for the preamplfier. It didn’t turn out the normal way at all. The Freya runs full tilt (no volume control) and the Volume Control from the Audio Alchemy DDP-1 works to control the volume. That’s the "kind of different" mentioned above. Now you say to yourself.... why would you put another piece in the system chain? Wouldn’t it sound better without the Freya. Well the answer came out in the 1st ten minutes of listening. The Freya Tube Mode just gave the perfect amount of "Tube Goodness" to my Martin Logan Montis speakers. So much that I couldn’t take it out of the chain, unless to remind myself of what the Freya added to a Solid State Krell, and the whole presentation. The best part was the ability to use one of the other Modes (Passive, or JFET) with the remote control on the Freya.
8 months later, I’m still every once in a while listening to my system in Passive or JFET Mode. The ability of these 3 Modes alone, will be of major use for owners of the Freya. All of the Modes sound amazing. I like the Freya and the choice they made with the (4) 6SN7 Tubes. They are one of my favorite Tubes. I think I’m up to 18 of them. I’m sure that going up in price about 5 times of the Freya could bring you a Audio Research Preamplifier used that would kick it’s ass. So that’s my take on the Freya. Highly recommended. And at $700, it got me tubes and balanced XLR with remote control. Try to find that at any price less than a few thousand dollars.
So I had an idea.... I had read one of the friends of the Schiit Company had used the Freya in a way that was kind of different. So I thought to myself that I would try to send my XLRs out of the Audio Alchemy DDP-1 to the Freya, and then out the Freya to the Krell amp. Figured that I could use the DAC on the Audio Alchemy DDP-1 and the Freya for the preamplfier. It didn’t turn out the normal way at all. The Freya runs full tilt (no volume control) and the Volume Control from the Audio Alchemy DDP-1 works to control the volume. That’s the "kind of different" mentioned above. Now you say to yourself.... why would you put another piece in the system chain? Wouldn’t it sound better without the Freya. Well the answer came out in the 1st ten minutes of listening. The Freya Tube Mode just gave the perfect amount of "Tube Goodness" to my Martin Logan Montis speakers. So much that I couldn’t take it out of the chain, unless to remind myself of what the Freya added to a Solid State Krell, and the whole presentation. The best part was the ability to use one of the other Modes (Passive, or JFET) with the remote control on the Freya.
8 months later, I’m still every once in a while listening to my system in Passive or JFET Mode. The ability of these 3 Modes alone, will be of major use for owners of the Freya. All of the Modes sound amazing. I like the Freya and the choice they made with the (4) 6SN7 Tubes. They are one of my favorite Tubes. I think I’m up to 18 of them. I’m sure that going up in price about 5 times of the Freya could bring you a Audio Research Preamplifier used that would kick it’s ass. So that’s my take on the Freya. Highly recommended. And at $700, it got me tubes and balanced XLR with remote control. Try to find that at any price less than a few thousand dollars.
