Kind of a dumb question...

With passive preamp there is a general rule that lower capacity (often shorter and better) cable between preamp and amp works better.
With active You can experiment and find out which combination You like most.
But don`t expect a "HUGE" difference from a cable. A decent cable is all You need.

Mr. Tennis is dead on, much to consider and if you ever do a cable shootout make detailed notes

Mr Tennis very very good answer.

My thought is to use the better cable between pre and amp because then all sources will benefit from the better cable. my 2 cents

If you can hear an audible difference between one configuration and the other then this will be an important health check of your system! An audible difference almost certainly means you have a problem either with your system or one of the interconnects is faulty.

Well designed, well matched and properly functioning audio equipment should not change audibly with different interconnects.