Schiit Freya plus. Is this an upgrade?

@mulveling, lol

If you don't need the remote their headphone amps (solid state and tube) can be used as preamps. 

I used headphone amps as preamps for a while. They can sound good, but a dedicated pre can be better optimized for that application because it never needs to drive loads below 10,000 ohms, which has implications for the choice of parts and design of the output stage. E.g. for many tube preamps that means the ability to use much higher quality, lower capacitance film caps (for output coupling) within budget.

I was just informed by Grover of Schiit Audio that Schiit has moved to using 7-10 thicker circuit boards "on some of their newer products." What this could mean for the Freya+ is less flex during tube rolling or changing..
    

Can these globe fubes fit in a Freya? The spacing is tight.
https://psvanetube.com/wordpress/store/products/treasure-globe-6sn7-se-pair-gf-limited-special-editi...