Bryston amps VS the rest... too clear and neutral?


Ok right now i am on the market for an amp..
need something in the 100W+ range stereo..
My speakers are Mirage OM-9 wich i really love!
( really nice in my small room because of small reverb times so it increases the volume and the presence alot with their bipolar setup!:)

Everytime i listened to mirage amps ( mostly 3b or 4B + )
i was really impressed by the clarity of the sound and the really nice neutral tonality of thoose amps.
Is it me or the Bryston are really neurtral amps that reproduce the sound really close to how it was input?
( like cheap records really sound cheap and everything sounds clear )

So i was asking myself is it is really good for a music used amplifier to sound almost perfectly the same as the input signal ? I mean, theorically this is what we are loking for right? but then, does it makes some music "hard" to listen to ? or gives fatigue quite fast on long listening periods?

So how does Bryston compares to most other high quality amps?
SS and tubes...

The only time i've been listening to other high end sutff is at the Montreal's Sound and image show and they all use different sources or speakers...it's so mixed up that you can't really put characteristics on any part of the systems but rather have to qualify to the complete system.

I've heard some $$ Logan sounds like crap on Classe amps because the source ( i think ) was really bad..
So it's pretty hard not having auditionned with a fixed system any or almost no other god amplifier brands to decide on wich path to go!

i hope that some of you have any input on that :)
thanks! :)

JIN

PS... i'm not even sure how my Mirage sounds since i didn't even try them on more than 2 amps ( yamaha and old akai :p )
jinmtvt

Showing 3 responses by marakanetz

Bryston amps tend to do a minimalistic job for the audio system. Extreams cannot be handled well by Bryston since they have bi-polar output stages that are very depended on weather, speaker impedance curve and... and... temperature of the amps.
Despite being absolutely linear in the measured ouput characteristics it might clip in different freequency areas depending on the speaker curve.
Please note that clipping might not be audiable but it will definitely cause a fatigue. An audiable clipping is characterized by trembling sound of the speaker driver. In SS case it is very distructive for a speaker. In many cases it will clip on higher freequencies not being able to drive a high impedance loads. That's where the rated output power realy drops down big time and clipping can occur even on arround 12:00 volume positions.
Most-likely 2-way speakers will be the most suitable for Bryston amps since the curve is not so complexed. Efficiency is not the key in this case since Brystons are enough powerful.
Despite having less gain and higher output impedance 100%MOSFET SS amps tend to be much more stable to different loads and so less fatiguing and very close to tubes even in some cases more preferable.
In your example with Logans, Classe I define simply extra-cost Bryston. If you hook-up Bryston with Logans I bet you wouldn't understand what's realy going on:^).
But do not blame Bryston too much. For a budget among Krell, Classe or even Edge the Bryston is a champ since it sounds not worse than Krell, far better than Classe and much less costly than both. Unbeatable 20 years transferable warranty, unbreakable power supply can tell you that it has a hell of a built quality.
I however, believe that these models I described above are "pedestrians" even including mega-buck Krells; but look out, there are plenty of "porches" on the market:^)
Dave, shortly saying for the entry- level Brystons are perfect - no comment. Much better than Classe, Krell or even Edge. They worked real great with my Totem Forest speakers. I used Bryston 11b preamp for a while and realized that it sounds too far away from music and I stepped into the different level when I traded 3b-st/11b for VTL MB100/passive preamp instead of Bryston components and entered entirely different world of musical reproduction. Let Stevie Wonder love Bryston but some of the home recording studio owners have Manley electronics and this is believe me alot different.

Aball, bipolar transistors have the highest rate of parameter instability. If you analyze the output curve set for different impedance loads and freequencies you'll realize when and where the bipolar element will "choke". Bipolar elements compared to MOSFET or tubes need an extreamly deep negative feedback in order to work in linear operation wich certainly causes the signal to be compressed.