Might try a tube preamp


I’ve been toying with the idea of giving tubes a try and thought I would start with a tube preamp running to my SS amp and see how I liked it.    

After reading reviews and looking through some of the posts here on Audiogon I’ve been thinking of a LTA micro ZOTL or rogue audio RP-7 - each around $5k.   Thoughts on these?  

Or would I be better off looking for something else used here on Audiogon?  Maybe a ARC Ref 5 or LS-28?  I’m pretty new to tubes so am open to options.

Thanks
rshad0000
These are all solid suggestions.  I would go with the Rogue. Great sound stage, imaging and detail. Also really friendly for tube rolling.  I have owned some of the units listed and when I was in the market for a new Preamp I compared Rogue with some of the units listed as well. Obviously I ended up with the Rogue. 
Nothing against the Rogue, they certainly do make nice equipment, but the most neutral 6SN7s are the Shuguang Treasure 1's, aka CV181T. I am sure that New Sensor will come out with something in their Gold Lion or Mullard line soon that competes, but that is the most neutral tube I have ever heard. If you are tube rolling beyond that, you have other issues in your system, and tubes are a bandaid. Like I said before, the Freya is a nice little preamp, but for it to compete it needs Ken Rads for proper tone, and early 40's Raytheons for imaging. You could use the CV181Ts for imaging as well. The point isn't to roll tubes, the point is to get your system right so that you don't need to!
I’ve owned a LOT of preamps and I consider the Freya to be a neutral, very well designed and way underrated giant killer with performance and features absent from really any other preamps at any price, although I haven’t heard every other preamp including those from Don Sachs, Don Juan, or Don Ho (Although I did sell a Fender Twin Reverb amp with JBLs and an Anvil case to Don Ho in maybe 1980...that’s another story). In my Freya I prefer some recently acquired NOS RCAs and NOS Sylvania "chrome domes" (although I’m not 100% sure the RCAs are better than the Sylvanias, but they’re in the somewhat less critical "output" stage). With these it certainly "competes," and if you don’t tube roll how the hell are you going to know which tube works best with your rig? Note that regarding cost, my Dennis Had "Inspire" Firebottle HO (it’s a HO...says so right on the front) was 4 months old when I bought it for about 1100 bucks, and the Freya new was 700...with $11,438 spent on 6SN7GTBs used in both. So I now have all of this for around $13,238. Take that Don Sachs! (is that like Don Juan? I hope it is if only for my sake). I’m running out of storage space for the tube collection, and may have to wire them up in a string as holiday ornaments.
Arugmentum ad hominem, how intellectual and original. That the Freya beats a more expensive commercial product, considering its designer, should surprise no one. Commercial products made in large numbers, and sold through small audio boutiques necessarily cost far more than the component parts do. There is designer overhead, manufacturing overhead, distribution costs, and dealer overhead, to name a few costs. Small independent makers are therefore not only able to compete, but in fact can offer much more for much less. They can use vastly better parts, and can easily better far more expensive gear. Sachs has spent his life as one of, if not the preeminent go to person for modifications and upgrades of Citation and McIntosh tube gear. Your credentials sir, you have owned a few preamps, who hasn't? You have owned a few tubes, I have a crazy collection myself, and Sachs has heard more than us both combined. Unlike you, I used to do equipment modifications myself, though I only did tube gear for myself and one other audiophile friend as I really didn't have time to relearn tube circuits. The tube gear once used for video pickup was replaced by CCD in the 1990s. The fully tubed gear used for low light applications was also replaced by CCD, but we maintained it, we didn't do mods, so I was uncomfortable doing mods on tube gear for others. Anyway, you know more than all, you implied it, so it MUST be true. So stop with they Freya, it is a decent tube preamp for the money, with the right tubes, which you are not using. The original poster didn't ask about a great entry level preamp or else the Freya would have been my recomendation.