Australian Hi-Fi Show Feedback

[James Tanner - Bryston]

Dear Brian,

I hope you are the man from Bryston who was at the Australian Hi Fi Show in Melbourne Australia October 21-23. I couldn't remember your name and had to ask my good friends at Carlton Audio Visual to chase it up for me via Syntec. I met you late Saturday morning and questioned why anyone would buy a BDP-1 over any other Streaming device. You presented a very convincing argument, but an even more convincing demonstration. Believe it or not, I can still hear how good that was. The sound was just outstanding - certainly at the top of the group "Best in Show" - I guess the only solution now is to budget for a purchase sometime next year.................................

No doubt, having met so many people at the show, you may not recall that I stated that I am already a very satisfied Bryston owner. I've lived with my 14BSST and BDA-1 for just over 1 year now, so I guess it's time I gave you guys some customer feedback. To put it in perspective I run a Musical Fidelity and Denon A1UD front end with Dynaudio speakers as the main front channels powered by the 14BSST. And, yes if haven't already guessed I've done what a lot of audiophiles say you can't do and combined a high end 2 channel system with the option to go 5 channel surround for SACD and other High Res surround formats. I had a lot of very much loved legacy gear I didn't want to trade, but saw an opportunity to upgrade with the 14B and the DAC.

The DAC came first as that was available ex stock. The improvement across the entire spectrum to the CD player was immediately obvious. Another step closer to that sense of being there. But! the real ear opener was the 14BSST power amp. My previous amp was no slouch, and I've owned great amps over the years. Crown (long time ago) Citation, Meridian, Musical Fidelity (one of the bigger beasts). But, and it's a HUGE But, nothing really prepares you for something this quiet and so damn fast and effortless. One year down the track, having dragged out discs I've not heard for a while, I still marvel at the speed of delivery of the music. It just sounds so much closer to the real thing. And it is so quiet. My workmate Dave, commenting on the Audio Show has said to me more times than I can recall how everything else seemed veiled by comparison to the Bryston room, so definitely - "Quietest in Show". (I'm trying to talk him into a more modest amp, maybe the 4BSST.)

If you go back to the mid 60's, an English amplifier manufacturer loved to use the line "the closest approach to the original sound". I owned one for a while, but of course it wasn't the straight wire with gain it was claimed to be. I believe the 14BSST and no doubt the 28 mono block achieve that aim. They do what they are meant to do, amplify the signal and not get in the way. And I will never need to buy another as you provide a 20 year warranty. Very comforting.

Further down the track I may look at going the full Bryston front end with a B26 Pre Amp, depends on the budget, you never know.

Thanks again for the helpful advice at the show, and thank you to everyone at Bryston for doing things differently.

Regards,
A very satisfied Bryston User.

[MyPal]

+1

The BDP-1 is a fantastic player. I had the opportunity of meeting Brian Russell, President of Bryston at the Melbourne HiFi show. The larger than life representative of Bryston is a really nice fella & of course he was happy to demo the BDP-1 using an iPad MPAD app. When pressed for spouse proof simplicity, his jovial response was "Just push play. It doesn't get easier than that!"

I would have to say that between Brian & his distributor here in Australia, they managed to pull off one of the best sounding rigs in show. The Bryston gear sounded superb with those German speakers & ran rings around the likes of their Canadian brothers upstairs with their Classe CA-M600 monoblocks, their new CP-800 pre/DAC & a pair of B&W 802 Diamonds.

Brian says that there is some upgrade headroom in the BDP-1, "but it will cost you".

The listening experience was impressive & their gear represents great value.

Looking forward to a BDP-1 addition.

(Apologies, the phone shot is not the best. It was just too busy to wield an SLR at the venue).