Schiit Freya+Preamp (Mint) and some valves

Sondekker

Wammer
Wammer
Sep 9, 2012
321
80
58
Ipswich, Suffolk
AKA
John
HiFi Trade?
  1. No
With some regret following a change of direction I am selling a mint Freya+ preamp including original box, owners manual, unused power cord and metal remote control.

Having previously owned and enjoyed an original Freya preamp I sold it a few years ago in favour of a Townshend Allegri+ but good though that was, I started to miss the tone and texture I remembered with the Freya and the convenience of remote control. I decided I wanted another Freya but supplies were not available in the UK and so I put my name down for a new one direct from Schiit when they were back in production.

This one, in black, and built to UK specification was delivered to me last August and so is now 10 months old. Although the total cost including insured international delivery, processing and import duty etc was higher than the equivalent UK price there was no likelihood of stock becoming available for the foreseeable future. I have just looked online and the UK distributor still doesn't have any stock or information on availability. If you are looking for one this may be your best chance.

The preamp was delivered with a quad of JJ 6SN7's which I have rolled in combination with a pair of GE 6SN7 GTB's, Russian OTK 6H8C's and more recently with NOS RCA 6SN7 GT's with black bases/plates.

For the purpose of clarification, two of the photos of the Freya show the preamp sitting on Audio Exklusive dCd feet. These are good resonance/vibration contol devices but they also have the advantage of lifting the Freya and increasing the flow of air around and below the preamp. The Freya preamps are known to get rather hot and I wanted to minimise any risk of heat damaging the very light-weight end-grain balsa shelves on my rack. The dCd feet are not included in this sale.

With a move back to solid state I see little point in keeping hold of the valves and so all are available for sale.

I am asking £950 for the Freya+ with the quad of JJ 6SN7's collected from Ipswich or £970 including RMSD with £1000 insurance at the buyers risk. Current UK price is £1125.

I paid £85 for the pair of NOS RCA's in January of this year and would like £45 plus postage.

The GE's and OTK's were originally purchased when I had the first Freya and were taken out of storage when the new Freya+ arrived. Asking £20 plus postage for the GE's and £10 plus postage for the OTK's.

Please note that I do not have any boxes for any of the extra valves but they will be carefully wrapped and packaged for posting or could easily be stowed in the main box alongside the freya+ if required. All of the valves have been tested in the Freya+ in the last few days and all worked perfectly but are not offered with any guarantee.

Freya+1.jpg
Freya+3.jpg
Freya+2.jpg
FreyaJJ.jpg
FreyaTubes.jpg
RCApair.jpg
GE1pair.jpg
GE2.1.jpg
OTKpair.jpg

Any questions please ask. Thanks for looking
 

Sondekker

Wammer
Wammer
Sep 9, 2012
321
80
58
Ipswich, Suffolk
AKA
John
HiFi Trade?
  1. No
In the unlikely event that anyone looking at this may not be familiar with this preamp it is an updated and improved version of the original Freya. It is a very flexible remote-controlled device sporting balanced and single-ended inputs and outputs which can be operated in three different ways - as a passive, JFET buffer or valve preamp.

There are numerous reviews to be found online which are worth reading if you are curious or thinking about purchasing it. Set out below are some quotes from the Fair Hedon review listed on Schiit Audio's website.

''In house is the new Schiit Freya+. It is an update to the Freya preamp, introduced in 2017. The differences are significant. There is an upgraded chassis, a much better remote control unit, and a redesigned tube stage which Schiit says lowers the noise floor significantly. Like the original Freya, there are three modes, passive, JFET buffer, and tube. They say the JFET buffer state has also been redesigned. Maybe the biggest welcome change is the tubes are shut down when the other two output modes are engaged.

To add some context to the observations above, we have had numerous far more expensive tubed preamps in the system, including multiple models from Rogue, Audio Research, Lamm, Manley, and others. It is our belief the Freya+ was not in any way embarrassed by these units, and in fact, held it’s own in every category except maybe for less elaborate case work.

To add another perspective, we have also had many “budget” tube preamps in for audition and while all of them sounded generally “good”, they all seemed to do one thing well, usually a smooth midrange, or they added some harmonic richness, but along with that a flat sounding top end, and somewhat sloppy bass. No such situation with the Freya+. It was difficult to find an area where it was deficient sonically overall''.
 
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