Bryston Customer Feedback

from

David Holmes - Owner
Audio Emporium.com

Bryston BP-25DA
In early 2003 we received notice from Bryston that it was building a D to A converter (DAC) into its preamps as an option, for a grand. It caught my interest but I didn't immediately do cartwheels. I should have. It has proven to provide a magnificent upgrade to CD sound! Now, to defend myself, I've heard manufactures brag for 20 plus years that they use "the best DACs" in the business. When you ultimately hear the CD players your response is invariably... sounds pretty much like the rest to me. Why all the commotion? In fact, we find sales hype is the genesis of these grand claims. But Bryston is different. So while I wasn't first on the block to hear the DAC, I have gotten around to it. WOW! What an improvement!

Bryston's game plan on this pathway to Nirvana includes anybody who owns a CD player or DVD player with a coax digital out. That's almost everybody! Here's how they do it. Suppose you have a nice, but fairly modest CD player, like a Rotel for $500 ish. It was a good buy, but now you're ready to reach higher ground. Bryston takes the incoming digital signal of the Rotel digital output and feeds it into an input transformer. Before hitting the DAC work itself, the impedance is properly matched and the grounds of the CD player and preamp are isolated. We now have separate grounds for digital and analog, which keeps the noise floor to a minimum. Bryston runs an asynchronous clock to eliminate the jitter from your CD player. Hence, the limitation of you fairly modest transport unit, is largely negated! A hand picked oscillator reclocks the signal to 96K/24 Bit. Why not 192K? Because if you run at 192K Bryston has discovered that the DAC itself is stressed and you worsen distortion and noise levels! The higher number of 192 looks cool, but it actually hurts the sound of your DAC.

After the oscillator the signal goes to a Crystal CS-43122 DAC. Bryston buys these DACs (and oscillators) in quantity and returns approximately 40% as unacceptable. In mass production of chips there is quite a range of performance in terms of distortion, noise and linearity. That's not good enough for Bryston. While some companies will use all the chips it receives, Bryston hand selects the cream of the crop! Hey, who uses the ones Bryston sends back?! After the signal comes out of the DAC IC itself, most companies employ an analog IC to amplify the analog signal. Bryston doesn't! Bryston uses its patented, DISCRETE, CLASS A operational amplifiers. These are the same amps used is the analog stage of the BP-20 and BP-25 that have earned critics' raves for years.

How much better is the result? First let's check the numbers. An analog IC can have a dynamic range swing of 3-5 volts. Bryston's DISCRETE, CLASS A op amp performs at 15 volts in an unbalanced mode, and 30 volts in a balanced configuration! The improved dynamics and lack of IC clipping is easily heard. Musically, the Bryston sound is more than glorious. As a classical piano fan I can assure you that the nuances in a piano's percussive action are stunningly better. The detail of the sound coming through the Bryston slaughters that of a terrific sounding CD player- like the venerable Rega Planet for example. We love the Planet- at $950 it's an excellent value. But, if you use a modest Rotel and run it into the BP-25 with DAC, sorry, no contest! The transparency, speed and dynamic contrast of the Bryston are in another league. You'll hear openness and a dynamic, breathy quality you've never experienced before!

If your associated components have even respectable levels of resolving capabilities, you'd be well advised to audition the Bryston BP-25 with built in DAC. It's significantly better than I expected. But then I thought virtually all DACs were similar, and that the DAC itself did all the work. Now I know better, and you do too!