Upgrading pre amp advice.

PRE90

Unless your amp has adjustable gain like a Parasound, stay away from the PRE90. I needed a cheap preamp recently and considered the PRE90 since I owned it before but then I remembered how awful to was to pair with amps. It also does even not sound that good with a compatible Parasound amp. I got the $279 Schiit Saga 2 instead which only does RCA.

Another preamp that is surprising decent is the Schiit Kara F. I sold that to raise some cash, but it was rather good. Not as good as the Benchmark LA4. I should have held of selling that.

A preamp that is comparable to the LA4 is the slightly warmer, Holo Audio Serene. I had both the Serene and LA4 in my 2 systems and rotated them round. It is also pretty good like most of the preamps recommended so far.

It lost a bit of luster to me when I took it to a friend's place and is prototype transformer based passive preamp just killed the Serene. I compared them side-by-side. My friend is building a new passive that I am waiting on, thus the purchase of the Schiit Saga 2 to hold me over.

I think a company called Bob's Devices sells something similar to what I am waiting on. As does Townsend Audio in the UK.

@mitch2 : is it comparable to a passive pre amp?

Maybe more people with experiences changing from Bryston BP 2x to another control amp??

@vhond - The idea was to preserve the natural sound of a passive while maintaining the dynamics and tonal color of an active stage. My upgraded TLC-1 provided unity gain, so it was an active buffer and it sounded way better than any of the passives I have owned/tried including, Goldpoint, Endler, and Hattor.

If I had to have a passive, I would look at an AVC type, which preserves suitable impedance matching so you don’t lose the bass punch and dynamics as you do with resistor passives.  I have owned several AVC preamps including icon Pro4, Acoustic Imagery JaySho and, most recently, Hattor’s ARP (link), which is what I would recommend to those who want an AVC preamp at a reasonable price.

Another (IMO) very good sounding preamp for the money is Hattor’s The Big Preamp (link) with AMRG resistors. It offers passive or active modes, with switchable gain levels of 3/6/9 dB.

My advice is to stretch your budget as far as you can, the preamp is a key component. And skip the combined DAC/pre setup. I have been through six preamps, including the LA4. I enjoyed the LA4, but in the end it was kinda sterile for my tastes. I also had a borrowed Ayre preamp in my system for a while. I liked it a lot, my only beef was the granularity of the volume, the steps were too big for my low volume listening habits. Of all the ones I tried, my favorites have been Pass and Audionet. Good luck with your search.