B&W & Bryston.. help?

[admin_exported]

Hi all, my first post here - although these pages have come in handy numerous times in the past.

I'm in a bit of a conundrum and need to know what you lot think and to help me make up my mind.

I recently bought a pair of B&W 685s (how amazing are they?! i love them). Shocking though i've been running them off various bookshelf component amps for lack of a better one. I'm currently enjoying the sound i get out of the Teac unit I'm using (particularly warm in the bottom end) but at only 60wpc it's missing that real neighbour-annoyance factor. Plus, I'm sure I'm committing some sort of crime, wasting my 685s on a rather poor amp.

Now the question is, should i invest over £500 buying a brand new amp (or maybe a 2nd hand one if i can find it) - the Roksan Kandy seems like a excellent pairing as well as others - or should i take a chance on having my Bryston 4b sent over from Canada?

I've used my bryston in the past for powering a Cerwin vega bassbin but never really for hifidelity sound. I know they have great reputations but are they known simply for brut strength or more finely-tuned muscle, capable of delivering clean waves of loveliness

It's going to cost me about £400 in shipping and possibly another £50-100 on a 120V to 240V power transformer. Around £500 and hence the dilemma.

Any thoughts?

 

[d_a_n1979]

What's your source and what kind of music do you listen to?

Also; what stands have you got your 685's on?

Fully agree; superb speakers and yes; they could definitely do better with a different amp over the TEAC.

IMO; for your budget or there abouts i dont think you could do better than the Roksan Kandy LIII (or the K2 if you can stretch your budget). You could also consider an Arcam A32 (if you can find one at trhe right price - eBay would be the place to look), a NAD C352 or C355BEE integrated amp OR; again, at the right price, a Cyrus 8v2 integrated.

I've demo'd all the above with the 685 speakers and they sounded superb; the NAD's and Roksan were the best to me followed very closely by the Cyrus 8v2 and then the Arcam.

 

[Anonymous]

well this is a great starting point, cheers for the input dan

Well i listen to absolutely everything. I DJed for 15 years and so have an unhealthy knowledge in all that bleeps and squeeks (Get Yourself High - Chemical Brothers was getting nailed earlier) but I also love folk, rock, Zero7, Sia, Kings of Leon, and classical (at the moment I'm listening to The Lark Ascending - Nigel Kennedy.. so all sorts)

I've got the speakers on my desk and listen from a laptop or Spotify.. bad idea?

what about the bryston 4b? not worth the fuss?

 

[matthewpiano]

Put those 685s on good strong stands! Partington Dreadnoughts will do the job. You'll never get the best out of them on a desk.

 

[d_a_n1979]

Yes; bad idea... tut tut!

To get the best out of the 685's you need dedicated speaker stands. IMO the lower end would be the Atacama Nexus 6i's loaded with atabites. Im using the Partington Super Dreadnoughts and theyre superb but cost nearly 3x the Atacama Nexus' so all depends on your budget!

Have you got a DAC connected to your laptop? If not that would be the next thing as well i'd say. The Beresford would be fine and can be bought fairly readily.

Looking at your musical tastes i'd aim for the NAD integrated amps; bags of power and would drive the 685's very well!

In the past i've only heard one Bryston amp; it was massive but that didnt show in its soundstage, from what i can recall, to me, it was a little flabby and hollow but we're talking 2 years ago now.

I think for the cash (and more if possible) good purchases would be:

- NAD C352 or the NAD C355BEE integrated amps.
- Speaker stands (Atacama Nexus 5/6's plus atabites & blutac)
- New speaker cable and interconnects (Chord Crimson and Chord Carnival Silverscreen would be highly recommended)

With those changes and the possible DAC; i think you'd notice a massive improvement in clarity and soundstage as well as deeper and more powerful bass once the 685's are at home on the stands!

 

[Anonymous]

Whoaah! thanks for all the input guys. what a can of worms eh?!

Cool, i think stands would be a good first step. As for the DAC, is it like an external sound card? I gather it stands for Digital Analogue converter.. ? I've got an M-Audio FastTrack soundcard which connects via USB. not the same thing?

 

[Anonymous]

I'd agree with the stands for the 685, although I went for the much sturdier built/looking Dreadnought "Broadside" versions because I got them for the same price as the B&W stands I was considering and they have a larger (perfect sized) top plate, too.

With £500 to spend I'd hold out until Rotel release their new 15 series integrated amp in the next few weeks as not only does it look really nice (looks almost identical to some of Krell's stuff except with slats on the front panel) and has the build quality to match, but I genuinly don't think, sound wise, there's a better match for lower to mid range B&W speakers than Rotel. B&W only use Rotel kit (or Classe at the high end) when developing new products and vice versa. I'm not saying it's the default choice but it definatley needs to be strongly considered.

As I've just started to get into computer based music production (but been into Hi-Fi a long time) I've looked long and hard into what the very best sounding soundcards are and the same name comes up over and over- RME, a german company. The sound quality of their DAC's are compared to CD players and other ultra high end soundcards like Lynx costing up to 10 times as much. I haven't looked into their lap top versions a great deal but if you wanted the absolute best sounding soundcard with it's own DAC then look no further. I'm not sure how much you would have to spend to get a seperate DAC that could be genuinly better but when so many professional studio's are using RME I don't see why you'd need to! Not at the kind of level we're talking here for 685's anyway.

 

[Anonymous]

As far as the stands are concerned I bought the B&W FS-805 stands and totally love them. Not only do they look great but they tightened up the sound in unimaginable ways.

Regarding the Bryston are you talking about the 4B, or the 4B SST? I have the Bryston Pre-Amp and will likely be selling my Bel Canto REF 1000's and buying a 4B SST. It gets fabulous reviews, and sounds terrific. I have listened to the 2B SST with my BP 26 pre and have been more than impressed. If you imported your 4B from Canada however you still have to deal with getting a quality PreAmplifier. Bryston is very strong in the pro arena and nothing I've read indicates that it won't stand up against any other similarly priced amp and pass with flying colours. Don't forget you get a 20 year warranty so I imagine there's still lots left on your amp.

What Hi-Fi's review on the 2B SST - http://whathifi.com/Review/Bryston-2B-SST/