SS pre sounds like tubes

so your preamp actually colors sound to be similar to tube preamps?

i prefer neutral sounding preamp no matter what it uses vacuum tubes or semiconductors for casual audio listening. for instruments and effects different. the most neutral sounding preamp i've ever had was mccormack micro line drive. i bought it for $300 shipped.

That's what I've always preferred in preamp: buffered active unity gain or low-gain. You get transparency, control and no color. I don't care how tubes or semiconductors sounding. I only care how music instruments and voices sound so to me "tube-like" sound means something wrong or missing.

Mitch2, I share same strategy:

IMO, it has nothing to do with tubes vs. SS, but rather does the preamp adequately drive the power amps, is it quiet and clean sounding, does it have body and drive, and is it musical.

In my approach lowest gain or unity buffered gain of preamp is the best surrounded by sources able to provide sufficient output level and sufficient sensitivity of poweramp. In other words fixed output components have large gain and variable output components have low or unity gain.