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Schiit Freya+ Pre-amp Review

Rate this preamp:

  • 1. Poor (headless panther)

    Votes: 98 43.9%
  • 2. Not terrible (postman panther)

    Votes: 64 28.7%
  • 3. Fine (happy panther

    Votes: 33 14.8%
  • 4. Great (golfing panther)

    Votes: 28 12.6%

  • Total voters
    223

Frank Sol

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Aug 30, 2021
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Have tubes ever 'measured' well ?

Rarely if ever... Many many people enjoy tube distortion in their musical listening

Many don't
 

enricoclaudio

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I own a Freya + ( The NOVAL version) and rarely use it in tube mode. When I use it, I always use it in passive or SS mode. The NOVAL version comes with 6N1P tubes and it cost currently $899. I think I paid around $600 with an industry accommodation discount. Thanks @amirm for another great review.
 

DesertHawk

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I came to post that I think the price you list is wrong (too high) but I see now it depends on which tubes you select.
 

Pulkass

Active Member
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Feb 17, 2019
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This is a review, detailed measurements and listening tests of Schiit Freya+ selectable passive, active solid state, and tube pre-amplifier. It is on kind loan from a member and costs US $1,199 plus shipping.
View attachment 220768
I am a fan of the wide aspect ratio Schiit audio products. They look a lot more classy than their compact versions. What I am not a fan of is rear power switch (especially for a tube amp), and controls with cryptic symbols. Luckily there are not too many of them and you can memorize them. Stepped relay volume control means chatter when you change volume with some static in the output but probably worth it for the channel match.

Unusual for a tube product is balanced input and outputs:
View attachment 220769

The included tubes are "matched" JJ 6SN7.

Given the three operational modes and many inputs and output variations, I chose to only test balanced input and outputs.

Gain settings are odd. While I can appreciate the pass-through mode being at 0 dB, the active solid state is also 0 dB while the tube mode is much more at 12 dB.

Schiit Freya+ Balanced Measurements
Let's start with passive mode with unity gain which required max volume (best case scenario for passive mode):

View attachment 220770

Naturally we more or less get the analyzer response. I am not going to show you the degraded performance as you decrease volume with this or other passive pre-amps. See my other reviews on this.

Switching to active SS mode produced surprisingly high penalty:
View attachment 220771

Look at the very large third harmonic. I expected the Freya S performance which is far, far better SINAD of 111 dB. Disappointing.

Switching to tube mode takes performance many more steps lower:
View attachment 220772

Power supply noise interferes and modulates the high harmonic spikes. The amplifier is quiet for a tube product:
View attachment 220773

And gets much better in the other two modes:
View attachment 220774

The active tube mode is capable of very high output:
View attachment 220775

Notice however how fast distortion sets in using active solid state mode. You can see the same in IMD test:
View attachment 220776

Crosstalk is extremely good:
View attachment 220777

Frequency response has a low frequency roll off even in solid state mode:
View attachment 220778

I wonder if it is capacitor coupled?

There is little frequency dependence in distortion profile which is nice:
View attachment 220779

Schiit Freya+ Listening Tests
Performing proper AB tests is made challenging due to much higher output level/gain of tube amp. Likely this is the reason for positive remarks for tube mode. And the fact that selecting the tube mode can cause a 45 second mute. I managed to still do a half-decent test by cycling from tube to the other two modes which is instant. And even in reverse by switching back to tube mode quickly before it decided to time out for 45 seconds.

Testing consisted of RME ADI-2 Pro as the source, driving the Freya+, which in turn drove Topping A90 Discrete as a headphone amp. I used my Dan Clark Stealth for listening tests. I set the volume to max when comparing passive mode to active solid state. There, I could not detect much of any difference. Sound was very good and essentially reflected the fidelity of my source.

Tube mode was not so situated. I could easily hear the grungy distortion that it was adding. Low level detail was hidden and impact in some notes gone. Mind you, these are clearly audible to me in AB test. In the absolute, it may be harder to hear the impairments. I ran through a number of clips and in no case did I like the tube mode. If I let it have much higher volume, then preference for it was much easier. But not when levels were matched.

Conclusions
The Schiit Freya+ is a disappointment. It seems to be a product mostly from Schiit's past where even solid state buffer mode has a lot of distortion. Likely it is a low feedback mode thought to make better sound. Thankfully the distortion that it adds is low enough as to not be audible to most people. And the good dynamic range will be a relief as far as background hiss.

The tube mode is just bad. Only in audio folks sell muddy water as a better substitute for clean and clear water. :( Copious amount of distortion combined with power supply noise that modulates the same (causing jitter like sidebands), both objective and subjectively (to my ears) only reduced the fidelity of music. No spatial qualities changed other than muddy background that took away some sense of space for music. You have to have drank the "tube sound" Kool-Aid undiluted to think this means better fidelity.

Overall, I see no reason to purchase this pre-amp. A much better bet and far better product is the Schiit Freya S. It is half the price and performs so much better.

I can't recommend the Schiit Freya+. Company can do better and is simply choosing to not do so. Disappointing.

-----------
As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.

Any donations are much appreciated using: https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/how-to-support-audio-science-review.8150/
Please test an Audio Research tube pre amp. Thanks.
 

Rat Salad

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Jul 23, 2021
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I got over most of my interest in tubes shortly after discovering ASR, but the vastly different distortion profiles (alongside its ultra-clean passive mode) makes the Freya+ an interesting product for those who might afford it. What are the odds @amirim will get to retest this using Schiit's new LISST "solid state tubes?"
How does discovering a website.. make you lose your interest in tubes?
 

PuX

Senior Member
Joined
Feb 16, 2018
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Are the tubes (and/or their sockets) really as mis-aligned as they appear in the photo?
also though this, they really look lopsided on this one.
I think it's common for tubes, they are always shaped a bit differently.
 

mhardy6647

Grand Contributor
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also though this, they really look lopsided on this one.
I think it's common for tubes, they are always shaped a bit differently.
It does happen, and it even happened in the heyday of vacuum tubes, when production numbers were high and QC... umm... was what it was. :)

If that's the case, here, it's no big deal. If the socket (which I am guessing is a PC mount) is soldered in crooked(ly), I would opine that's inexcusable in a thousand USD audio component. If the socket has very different tensions from pin to pin (due to design or construction), that's kind of hard to excuse at the price point, too.

These being the reasons I asked about it/mentioned it. :)
 

bboris77

Senior Member
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Oct 23, 2018
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@amirm, I know this is slightly off-topic, but I will ask it anyway: Have you ever considered measuring a product specifically and intentionally designed to add distortion to the original sound? An example of this would be something like The Ibanez Tube Screamer (TS808/TS9) - an overdrive guitar pedal.

The reason why I am asking is because it would be interesting to know how much distortion it actually adds to the clean sound at various settings and what exactly it does to the original sound that makes the outgoing signal appear subjectively "better" to the listener.
 

Here2Learn

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Jan 7, 2020
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I don't understand why this product exists. If you have a passive, you shouldn't have long interconnects to drive, but if you do, switching it to 'active' should be an effort to provide the same performance and SQ. It doesn't do that, so for me this is simply broken. More so when one considers the output voltage behavior between passive and active mode and whether a downstream amp can handle a 15V input without clipping. As this is aimed at domestic audiophiles, and most domestic amps wish to see 4Vrms on XLR, how is this ever going to work to sound good in an audio shop and shift units? And if an audiophile likes it in 'passive' mode, but does have long interconnects to drive, how is this going to satisfy them in 'active' mode when sounding different? I just cannot see that it can.

Can we have an outright "FAIL" category below 'Poor'? I'd vote this one goes there.
 

Scot_Douglas

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Feb 25, 2022
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I don't understand why this product exists. If you have a passive, you shouldn't have long interconnects to drive, but if you do, switching it to 'active' should be an effort to provide the same performance and SQ. It doesn't do that, so for me this is simply broken. More so when one considers the output voltage behavior between passive and active mode and whether a downstream amp can handle a 15V input without clipping. As this is aimed at domestic audiophiles, and most domestic amps wish to see 4Vrms on XLR, how is this ever going to work to sound good in an audio shop and shift units? And if an audiophile likes it in 'passive' mode, but does have long interconnects to drive, how is this going to satisfy them in 'active' mode when sounding different? I just cannot see that it can.

Can we have an outright "FAIL" category below 'Poor'? I'd vote this one goes there.
It's quite possible that the people that own them enjoy them. I'm not sure why there's 12db gain added for the tube stage, but I really like how mine sounds.:)
 

PeteL

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I don't understand why this product exists. If you have a passive, you shouldn't have long interconnects to drive, but if you do, switching it to 'active' should be an effort to provide the same performance and SQ. It doesn't do that, so for me this is simply broken. More so when one considers the output voltage behavior between passive and active mode and whether a downstream amp can handle a 15V input without clipping. As this is aimed at domestic audiophiles, and most domestic amps wish to see 4Vrms on XLR, how is this ever going to work to sound good in an audio shop and shift units? And if an audiophile likes it in 'passive' mode, but does have long interconnects to drive, how is this going to satisfy them in 'active' mode when sounding different? I just cannot see that it can.

Can we have an outright "FAIL" category below 'Poor'? I'd vote this one goes there.
As mentioned in the review, a passive attenuator (if it's all there is to the passive circuitry) have other flaws that are not measured as part of this review. The output resistance is by definition variable which can be undesirable. + the fact that you don't have long interconnect don't mean that you can't have balanced sources or amps with balanced inputs. You will loose gain on those with the passive mode. That's why this product exist, among other things like a tube stage. Yes it can be a fail in your book. you don't need a category for this, you just expressed your verdict.
 

Here2Learn

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It's quite possible that the people that own them enjoy them. I'm not sure why there's 12db gain added for the tube stage, but I really like how mine sounds.:)
No doubt. And I've no problem with people liking what they like. I just think active and passive mode should essentially sound the same - and ideally, both put out 4Vrms unless gain is controllable (it might be, could have missed that if it was mentioned, but doesn't look like it from the output graph). As is, it's transparent in unity-gain as a passive, or a very tubey-sounding active - and I don't think they'll appeal to the same people. Perhaps it's intended to essentially be two different products in one box, aimed at two markets: those who like transparent and those who like 'analog warmth' - but it's not a business decision I'd bank on if I ran an audio company. Different strokes for different folks I guess.
 

DSS

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Well yes, but you are arguing semantics.... I meant measurements.
Any first party measurement is always something to be skeptical of.

I can understand that, might be hard to do though. Because then the users would have to play back the sound through their DACs & Amps to see if the other DAC or Amp is musical ;x
We should be skeptical of any measurement.
 

PeteL

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It's quite possible that the people that own them enjoy them. I'm not sure why there's 12db gain added for the tube stage, but I really like how mine sounds.:)
The 12 dB gain is the main reason I use the tube stage personally. many audio sources are not really adequate to hit modern 29 dBish gain power amps at unity gain.
 
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