[emrelights1973]

Bryston plays well with Naim source

Having a green Light is a bonus!

i wish it had a remote!

 

[ACDOAN]

Bryston plays well with Naim source

Having a green Light is a bonus!

i wish it had a remote!

WOW, I love Naim's and Bryston's products. Wish I was young again.

 

[emrelights1973]

WOW, I love Naim's and Bryston's products. Wish I was young again.

I am not young but young at heart and ears!

 

[ACDOAN]

I am not young but young at heart and ears!

Well my ears are still good for a 65 yrs old man. I have a very discriminated ears even 'til now. It could be a bad thing to since I spent great deal of $$$ for my 2 channel gear many moon ago but I have no regrets.

As the good folks at Martin Logan say, " happy listening".

 

[mthaynes]

Was able to find a demo unit at Audioadvisor. $1424. tts the F model. Pairing with an AK2000, PEF21 silver dragon dual male 3 pins and HD800S.

 

[SilverEars]

Was able to find a demo unit at Audioadvisor. $1424. tts the F model. Pairing with an AK2000, PEF21 silver dragon dual male 3 pins and HD800S.

Any impressions or opinions?

I find Schiit DACs like Gumby or Yggy pairs well with it.

Although Spec'd not to have gobs of power, but it actually is quite strong. I think the gain is high.

Bass generally is noticibly good improvement. It's one of those amps that's solid-state, but don't sound solid-state.

 

[mthaynes]

Any impressions or opinions?

I find Schiit DACs like Gumby or Yggy pairs well with it.

Although Spec'd not to have gobs of power, but it actually is quite strong. I think the gain is high.

Bass generally is noticibly good improvement. It's one of those amps that's solid-state, but don't sound solid-state.

nope just got he shipping notice. I want to see the unit first and then I will pull the trigger on the cables. I have a everything else

 

[wormcycle]

Any impressions or opinions?

I find Schiit DACs like Gumby or Yggy pairs well with it.

Although Spec'd not to have gobs of power, but it actually is quite strong. I think the gain is high.

Bass generally is noticibly good improvement. It's one of those amps that's solid-state, but don't sound solid-state.

The gain could be too high depending what DAC you are pairing it with. With BDA-2 I had to do a mod lowering the gain by 12dB. Otherwise I could not go past 10:30 on the volume knob even with big planars like HEKv2. The mod is reversible, Bryston did it for roughly $100 CA including shipping.. This is a great amp for HD800S, HEKv2, even IEMs like Campfire Vega scale up with BHA-1.

 

[SilverEars]

The gain could be too high depending what DAC you are pairing it with. With BDA-2 I had to do a mod lowering the gain by 12dB. Otherwise I could not go past 10:30 on the volume knob even with big planars like HEKv2. The mod is reversible, Bryston did it for roughly $100 CA including shipping.. This is a great amp for HD800S, HEKv2, even IEMs like Campfire Vega scale up with BHA-1.

The first time I realized how great this amp sounded was in the audio shop trying out the Utopia. I was listening to Jazz at the Pawnshop and was blown away how realistic the Jazz bar background chatter sounded. I realized then a headphone setup can sound realistic. Luckily the Ayre codex provided a realistic timbre and depth the imaging. Then later I found out Codex sounded similar to Gumby.

Second realization was when I listened to SR325e out of it at the shop. It sounded better than any amps they they had at the shop. BHA-1 brought out the transparency, and was at another level.

BHA-1 is quite special to me as it's the amp I realized that there are such amps out there.

 

[alegar]

I have been with the BHA-1 for years and all the headphones I have are heard well, in the photograph connected LCD-X with balanced Cardas cabling 3 tips.

 

[mthaynes]

Ok so I got my BHA-1F


I bought what was advertised as a “demo” unit for $1,424. Considering new they are $2,195 I was curious to see if the unit had been abused or damaged. Fingers crossed – then I got a great surprise.


Below is the box. That folks is factory Byrston packing tape. I have a few Bryston components in my theater so I know what they look like. This box had never been opened!!! This unit was NEW. I checked and on the other side of the box, and found the original shipping label from Bryston to the reseller showing a ship date of July 2019.

OK so what it does it sound like. Without a lot of talk on base, mids and uppers. This biggest impression is the sound stage is huge.


My source is an Astell&Kern SP 2000 Copper. Headphones are HD800s


1st test was the AK powering the 800s directly via black dragon cables. The cables use the 2.5 balanced connection on the AK. They are 48” cables. Sound is great and impressive. No issues here.


2nd test the BHA-1F entered the pictured. I connected the AK to the BHA via an Astell&Kern PEF21 cable. This is a balanced connection at the AK and terminates in XLR’s to the Bryston. The factory single ended cable was used to connect the HD800s to the Bryston. AK was put in line out mode leaving the bryston to manage the volume.


Using the same source track the sound difference is significant. With test 1 the music was coming from the headphones, its good don’t get me wrong, but in test 2 the sound felt like it was coming from some magical spot that existed 8 inches outside of the head phones and all around my head.


30 seconds of listening and yes done. She is a keeper. That’s all you need for demo time with this unit. Less than a min


I have since added Dual 3pin silver dragons for the HD800S (these add another 2 inches to the 8 inch sound stage described abov) and a very expensive focal headphone stand. The stand is totally gorgeous and matches my setup.

 

[Amish]

This amp is one of the most neutral sounding amps I have ever listened to. I too ran it with a black dragon cable and the amp IMO doesn't really add much to anything. Its just so neutral sounding. I sold mine off a long time ago because I was never truly satisfied with it but I will say, build is excellent, and if you like an amp that doesn't add much if anything to the sound then yeah it's a great choice. In SE mode I disliked this amp a lot but in balanced mode I was pleased with the output.

 

[SilverEars]

This amp is one of the most neutral sounding amps I have ever listened to. I too ran it with a black dragon cable and the amp IMO doesn't really add much to anything. Its just so neutral sounding. I sold mine off a long time ago because I was never truly satisfied with it but I will say, build is excellent, and if you like an amp that doesn't add much if anything to the sound then yeah it's a great choice. In SE mode I disliked this amp a lot but in balanced mode I was pleased with the output.

Funny thing is, people say that about other amps. The word neutral gets tossed around a lot. The way I see this amp is, it doesn't have harsh treble characteristics that a lot of sold-states can have, and bass response is quite good, particularly on Sennheisers with good tight gripped response with elevated quantity than usual. The driver control is quite good that the dynamic drivers respond quickly. This is noticible. It's not a warm amp in the mids people will find with HD650 as it can get warm in the mids depending on the amp.

Sound stage can be wider out of balanced output, compared to other solide-state I tried, it does seem to widen the sound space. Definately wide for a solid-state.

HD800 is bearable with these. If you compare with Phonitor, Phonitor might actually be 'neutral' that brings out greater treble and can get fitiguing quicker with it. So, treble doesn't get as bad as most solid-state can get with these.

It has characteristics of a precise tube amp. It's decay characteristics is like a good tube amp, and phonitor doesn't have this. It's quite unique.

 

[Amish]

Funny thing is, people say that about other amps. The word neutral gets tossed around a lot.

Funny as it may sound, this is one of the most neutral sounding amps I have ever listened to. Most amps color the music some to one extent or another. I was paying this Bryston a compliment actually. Though I ended up not enjoying this amp myself due to being a bigger fan of tube amps, I can't deny that it is a solid choice for headphones.

In my experience the HD600 wasn't the best pair for it but I did like the LCD2 on it.

 

[SilverEars]

Funny as it may sound, this is one of the most neutral sounding amps I have ever listened to. Most amps color the music some to one extent or another. I was paying this Bryston a compliment actually. Though I ended up not enjoying this amp myself due to being a bigger fan of tube amps, I can't deny that it is a solid choice for headphones.

In my experience the HD600 wasn't the best pair for it but I did like the LCD2 on it.

Understandable. Just because it has such characteristics I mention doesn't mean this amp glosses over fine details, it's quite transparent.

I thought 300 ohm Sennheisers in general were good matches, and it brought more out of the HD6 series, and with 600, more bass as it's the most rolled-off.

The differences can be due to different DACs. I found Gumby and Yggy to work quite well with it.