Which would you choose for good sounding tube preamp for an audiophile new to tubes.

@arichison One other contender I would look at is a Rogue 99 Super Magnum on the used market. Make sure it is a Super Magnum, not just the stock, and not just the Magnum. The 99 on its own uses four 6SN7 tubes which are very fun to roll, as well as different gain settings in addition to the volume to best match with the rest of your system. The Super Magnum builds on this by adding Mundorf Supremes over the stock caps, Cardas solid copper connectors and Cardas wiring internally. IMO the best money you can spend on a preamp for $1500 or less.  

I agree with mesch, QS is quality gear, but Aric Audio should be your next consideration! Superb sounding preamps/line stages and unbeatable customer service is why the only piece of gear to remain on my rack after all other components have ben swapped in/out at least two times is, The Motherlode.

You cannot go wrong with the Quicksilver's, I have both the one with remote and the one without remote, both last versions. They both sound very good, I think the non remote has better imaging, but for a small margin. I mostly use the one with remote simply for the convenience.

@arichison  There is an Aric Audio 6sn7 tube pre being offered here on AG. I believe asking price is ~$1700. Aric offers great service on his products. I intend on having Aric upgrade my Special.

Schitt Freya preamp into a Pass Labs X-2A5 amp sounds interesting but it is a 5,000 dollar amp. I like the synergy that is mentioned. The most important point is this! Thomas says nothing is more important, I agree and most all of you do as well. 

Synergy! A match. 

If you are looking for an amp for the Freya+. They I would not get anything warm like a PASS. I went with the Benchmark AHB2 + Freya+. It was a really good match and what you will hear is the Freya+. The AHB2 adds nothing.

A cheaper variant of the AHB2 cold be the custom Purifi builds that you can get for under $1500.

For well under $1500 the Elekit preamps are supposed to be very good.I have read comments about them being better than the Freya.

I have an Elekit TU-8500 Preamp on USAudiomart that I would be happy to sell for $400.  

Quicksilver, one of the best , under the radar companies out there .   

I do consider Quicksilver one of the higher value companies. I might consider the company to be under appreciated, not so sure about under the radar. :-)

I recommend Concert Fidelity CF-080LSX

http://www.concertfidelity.jp/reference_series.html#cf080

The Supratek ones offers a lifetime warranty.

I love tube preamps.  I have in play now both tube and solid state.   Audio GD, Don Sachs and Supratek all make fine sounding tube preamps.  The Black Ice hybrid preamp is really good - especially if u replace the stock TungSol tube with a Linlai 6SN7: i use this preamp in my highly resolving reference system.  The SPL Elector is solid state but has no solid state shortcomings.  If I told u that u were listening to a contemporary tube preamp, u would not flinch.

Buy an old Counterpoint preamp - recommend the cheapest one you can find.  Send it to me for upgrades and you will never look back.

The old stock units sound really good especially in the mid-range.  They can use a little bit of help in the high-end and low bass but not much.  They compare to everything recommended here and then some.

Happy Listening.

Look into Aric Audio for all tube preamps. They have a variable gain control knob on them making it very easy to pair with an amplifier. 

Is a tubed preamp with an output imp.of 800ohms,a good match with a SS power amp input imp of 22k ohms.

Couldn’t edit because time but ment to say 800 ohms not 8000 ohms. Hi

Is a tubed preamp with an output imp.of 800ohms,a good match with a SS power amp input imp of 22k ohms.

@tmaker 
I suspect these systems with weak preamp output drives coupling into low input impedance amplifiers are the same systems where cables appear to make a massive difference as to how it sounds.

That 10:1 ratio get one into the area where cables don’t matter, and you have synergy from the electrical perspective, rather than a magical and unexplainable synergy.

I might be wrong, so YMMV.

I've had a few preamps roll through in the past two years. Out of the parade, I kept the Aric Unlimited II for the downstairs/main system. Just today I swapped out Tung Sols for a pair of Sylvania 12AU7a. After a few more days I might swap amps again. I'm using the McCormack 0.5 Deluxe, with the Precision Fidelity M8 on deck.

If you have any questions about the Aric, feel free to message me.