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Readers of Stereophile need no introduction to Bryston, a venerable Canadian electronics manufacturer known for the quality and reliability of its amplifiers and preamplifiers, and for its unique 20-year warranty. In the past few years, Bryston has ventured into digital audio with notable success, producing D/A converters, multichannel preamplifier-processors, and music-file players. While an evolution from analog into digital audio would seem logical, their most recent expansion, into loudspeakers, is more surprising. Apparently, James Tanner, Bryston's vice president, designed a speaker…
With the Middle Ts (and no DEQX or other processing), large ensembles of all types and well-recorded operas were presented in large, holographic soundstages that approached what I enjoy with my multichannel system. Take, for example, the 24-bit/96kHz remastering of the 1963 recording of Britten's War Requiem, with the composer leading the London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus (BD, Decca 478 5433)—a towering performance that has not yet been supplanted by newer ones made with more modern recording technologies. With just a pair of Middle Ts to handle the massive forces and familiar acoustic of…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Three-way, reflex-loaded, floorstanding loudspeaker. Drive-units: 1.0" titanium-dome tweeter, 5.25" polypropylene-cone midrange, two aluminum-cone 8" woofers with substantial half-roll surrounds. Crossover frequencies: 160Hz, 2.3kHz. Frequency response on reference axis: 33Hz–22kHz, ±3dB. Sensitivity: 88dB/2.83V/m, anechoic. Nominal impedance: 4 ohms. Recommended amplification: 10–250W. Maximum SPL at 1m: 112dB.
Dimensions: 39.4" (1000mm) H by 10.4" (267mm) W by 16.3" (419mm) D. Weight: 81.4 lbs (37kg).
Finishes: Black Ash, Natural Cherry,…
Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Digital Sources: Oppo BDP-105 universal Blu-ray player; Baetis XR2 PC-based music server; exaSound e28, Mytek Stereo 192-DSD D/A converters.
Preamplification: Audio Research MP1 preamplifier, Meridian HD621 HDMI audio processor & 861 V8 Reference digital surround controller.
Power Amplifiers: McIntosh MC303, Parasound Halo A 31.
Loudspeakers: Bowers & Wilkins 800 Diamond.
Cables: Digital: AudioQuest Vodka HDMI & Carbon USB, Black Cat Veloce. Analog: AudioQuest Cheetah (balanced). Speaker: AudioQuest Mont Blanc (biwire). AC:…
Sidebar 3: Measurements
I used DRA Labs' MLSSA system and a calibrated DPA 4006 microphone to measure the Bryston Middle T's frequency response in the farfield, and an Earthworks QTC-40 for the nearfield responses. (The grilles were left off for all the measurements.) My estimate of the Middle T's voltage sensitivity was 85dB(B)/2.83V/m, significantly lower than the specified 88dB/W/m.
Though the Middle T's impedance is specified as 4 ohms, my measurement indicated that the magnitude remained above 4 ohms up to 30kHz (fig.1, solid trace). However, while the electrical phase angle…
Art Dudley wrote about the Azur 851D in February 2015 (Vol.38 No.2):
It's November 18, and by the time you read this my family and I may be snowed in. Soon enough, our driveway will become an obstacle for the man who delivers our firewood, the man who delivers our drinking water, and our local UPS and FedEx couriers.
One delivery came in under the wire. Last week our UPS man, whom we would recommend for canonization were such a thing within our powers, came by with an unexpected parcel: John Atkinson had forwarded to me the magazine's review loaner of Cambridge Audio's Azur 851D D…
Robert Deutsch wrote about the DirectStream DAC in February 2015 (Vol.38 No.2):
Ayre Acoustics' CX-7e CD player came on the market in 2002. I bought one in 2007, and enjoyed its smooth, musical sound, which in 2009 was further advanced by the MP upgrade.
Time passed. The high-resolution disc formats of DVD-Audio and SACD failed to catch on, and I stayed with CDs. Then came hi-rez downloads and streaming. I stayed with CDs. Now we have the apparent rebirth of DSD, the codec used for SACD, as a download format—and there's PonoMusic, with the promise of a hi-rez format for the masses…
A couple of weeks before I was to submit this Follow-Up, I received an e-mail from Paul McGowan saying that he wanted to send me new firmware for the DirectStream that was to be released to the general public in a few days. The firmware is in the form of a computer file that can be e-mailed, transferred to an SD card, and inserted in a slot on the DS. According to McGowan, the new firmware, the work of Ted Smith, not only fixes the bass-distortion problem that John Atkinson had identified in his measurements, but represented an overall improvement in sound quality.
I was e-mailed the new…
I wish I'd had a VPI Nomad when I was in college. I was in a fraternity, and for most of my time there I had to rely on others' sound systems to play my music. My sophomore and junior years, some freshmen were rotated through my room, and several of them had nice sound systems and were accommodating about letting me play my music. When I wanted to really crank it up, I visited the stoners, who had the best systems and were happy to spin my collections of King Crimson and ELP, assuming I could get them to stop listening to Jefferson Starship for five minutes (footnote 1).
By my senior year…
The Nomad's impressive low-level dynamic capabilities made it easy to analyze individual phrasing techniques in jazz-piano solos, such as McCoy Tyner's on his The Real McCoy (LP, Blue Note BLP 4264) and Herbie Hancock's on his Empyrean Isles (LP, Blue Note BN 84175). But there was a loss of detail in high-level, highly modulated dynamic passages on the Tyner LP and in Chick Corea's piano solo in "Humpty Dumpty," from his The Mad Hatter (LP, Polydor PD-3-6130).
The Nomad's transient articulation was superb. In Charles Wuorinen's Speculum Speculi, with Fred Sherry conducting Speculum…