Upgrading pre amp advice.

@vhond Why bigger brands? All my audiogear is from smaller companies, and 80 percent from Europe. Less overhead, no import taxes, and if I need to know something I just call them or send an email 

@stievus : don't get me wrong (as you can see I myself am using smaller brands): the availability of smaller foreign brands is limited.

I notice many people mention tube gear, not that I don't like tubes but I am not looking for a warm sound (maybe less analytical as I have now). The advantage you can swap tubes to adjust the sound.

Since you are in Europe, how about something like the SPL Elector. It is in the same spirit of the smaller brand Bryston, pure SS analog with a retro flare to it, and reasonably priced. I was considering this one, but discovered it only after ordering something else.

https://spl.audio/en/spl-produkt/elector/

Look at this absolute sound review.

https://youtu.be/NMcIE3K2bD8?si=v5IAb0hVbfJE3wHe

I love my LTA level 3 preamp. Others that I’ve owned and recommend are the Holo Serene KTE, and Audio GD pre with the built in regenerator. I had the tubed version but you can get it solid state as well. Also had the Sachs pre and while I liked it I didn’t like it as much as the ones above. Also had a Grimm MU2 and while the dac is great I think it’s pre section is the star of the show. Saying that because I fed some other dacs into its preamp in and a/b’d the internal dac with my external dacs and there wasn’t a huge difference. But when comparing the pre section to my Holo Serene, which I loved, there was a noticeable difference.