I'll try and keep this short as there are already plenty of reviews praising this amp. This is my first amp in this price range and perhaps my last( given the 20 year warrenty. I have always been a bit heisitant to move into up to this level of audiophilia. I prchased the Bryston unheard. I went almost completely on the reviews here and other places, very risky practice to be sure. I was down right nervious about spending this much $$ on an amp and not getting a return on my investment. I upgraded from a B&K.
To put it simply: WOW! I cannot believe the refinement my system has achieved. The mids are oh-so-sweeter...backgoung is completely black...bass is so much tighter...and my SF Concertos opened right up!! I thought the best I could hope for was to "hear" some differnce....WOW! What a difference. Before I purchased the amp I was considering upgrading my speaker instead. That would have been a mistake as this amp will make any speaker I may buy in the future that much better. As an extra treat my REL Storm kick awaked from hibernation with this amp, with the B&K it was good but with the Bryston signal I get so much more slam...I had to "re-set-up" the Storm after putting the 3b-ST it the loop.

Great AMP worth every penny of the price!!!

I have tried many amps over the past 20 years from my 1st seperates a Phase Linear 400 to a Boulder ae250, a Classe' cap-150 and even a Bryston 4BST. There was many in between all of those as I was a lost soul looking for that perfect amp! I did not find the perfect amp but I did find a amp that gives me a little of everything. Good bass,highs and sweet mids with good pace and punch. The Bryston 3BST is sweeter than it's big brother and only loses out in headroom in mho. If you have fairly efficient speakers then try out this amp you won't be sorry! And their is no finer company to deal with as they are people freindly.Chris Russell and James Tanner are always their to help if there's any problems and with the 20 yr warranty this amps a steal...

I purchased the Bryston 3 months ago. It is a great little amp. Excellent bass, silky midrange. In my opinion, it lacks in soundstaging compared to more expensive amps, but given its price and warranty this is real value.

Sweet sounding amp, durability and power.

None so far

I bought this amp about a month ago from an honest seller on this this ad. It has 17" faceplate which was OK but I prefer to have it with 19" faceplate. In short, I mailed Chris Russell about faceplate replacement and within a week I got the 19" faceplate with easy to follow instuctions, this is my kind of people and company to deal with. I ran this amp for 6 days (non stop) since it's never been break-in yet as what I have told. Here it is after 6 weeks
This amp sounded so sweet (highs and lows) and all the details of music I was hearing was so unbelievable. Detailed that was not heard before from my old Carver amp. I'm also impress with it's power.
I'm thinking about getting another 3BST in the near future. With a TOP NOTCH customer service, excellent product and a 20 years warranty you can never go wrong.... Tell me who's company that gives the same warranty, anybody knows?..

CD PLAYER - CAL Icon Mark 2 with power boss
PRE AMP - CJ PFR
SPEAKERS - Legacy Focus
INTERCONNECT - Kimber PBJ and Transparrent Link 100
SPEAKER CABLE - Kimber 8TC

Similar Products Used:

Krell and ML

I'm really satisfied with the purchased of the Bryston 3B-ST. I'm a audiophile on a budget, so this is just the right price-performance amplifier for me. I'm using the Bryston to my Mirage M3si speaker and I love it! This is a great amplifier, try it. Anyone who is comparing this to Krell, Bryston 7B, ML, Audio Research and all those other's stat-of-the-art amplifier and says that this is equal to them is lying. This is a solid-state amplifier that only cost 1/4 of the state-of-the-art amplifier. So what's the verdict. If you look at the price/performance it's a five star amplifier, but if you only compare the sound to state-of-the-art amplifier this is a four star amplifier. My verdict is a five star because the price if of great important for me.

I was auditioning several amps, and out of luck, took a pair of Bryston 3B'shome. I bridged both amps, so each one dished out 400 W, and used each
one for each speaker.
WOW, it sounded better than anything I've listened to. I even tried a Bryston
4B, and that amp couldn't even touch this setup.
Needless to say, after four months and 5 amps later these 3B's haven't left
my place since, and here they will stay for a long time.
For anyone trying Bryston amps, and concidering a Bryston 4B, a pair of 3B's
bridged to monoblocks are far superior. The bass is more pronounced, midrange
is smooth as a baby's bottom, and treble seems smoother and cleaner.
It may cost you several hundreds more, but it's well worth it.

Simply breath taking at first listen. I was listening to amps like Levinson, Classe', Aragon, etc., at the dealer when I discovered the Byrston 3B. The sound was comparable to the other high end amps mentioned above in low end drive and smoothness and maybe even better than some. It's conservative 120W/CH rating sounded more like 200Watts and seemed to have a lot more drive than the Adcoms. The 3B's top end is foward and accurate but it wasn't as sweet as the Levinson. Not too many amps are. The 3B's top end was free of grain and sounded much more open compared to the Aragon 8008 and the Adcom 5800. This amp is flexible in the sense that it can be configured as a 400W(8ohms) monoblock. The Bryston 3B is an extremely awesome value at $1500. The Levinsons and the Classe's may be a tad more musical but they also cost much more. The Levinson I auditioned went for more than 4 times the cost of the 3B. I couldn't justify paying that much more for what I felt was a relatively small improvement.
As you've probably already guessed, I love my 3B. I'm running the 3B with Bryston's line stage .5B pre-amp and they sound great together. I stronly recommend auditioning this amp before forking out the $$$BIG Bucks for other highend amps.

I have owned several Bryston products over the years and have always been taken by the sound quality and build quality of their products. Even after selling Levinson and Audio Research gear, I still was enamored with the unostentatious gear they built. It didn’t hurt to have them send me a note in the mail saying that the gear I had purchased several years earlier had the warranty extended retroactively from a robust five years to a more geological twenty years. So I recently bought a new 3B-ST to replace my old 3B with great results. The new amp has significant more dynamic headroom. I didn’t think that my old amp was a whimp, but compared to some of the new designs (Sunfire), it lacked the type of super power normally associated with super amps (Krell and Levinson). But in the old days when I bought the original 3B, new designs like the Sunfire were known as the ‘Carver Cube’ which really wasn’t the best sounding thing going. Krell and Levinson weren’t yet in the business of building amps that require 40 Amp dedicated lines that would cause a brown-out in a third world country. In the new 3B-ST Bryston has modernized the old design while keeping up with the Joneses. The new amp seems to have all of the dynamics I require to put the hurt on my neighborhood, along with even deeper, tighter bass (the old 3B already had state-of-the-art bass, even when compared to the Levinson and Krell stuff). There is also a significant improvement as well in the midrange clarity. One thing that Bryston has done that may go unnoticed is they have reduced the noise floor of the amp to almost inaudible. This is the quietest amp that I have ever heard, period.
I highly recommend this amp. If you are considering getting an amp with more power, look at a 4B or the Sunfire. I’ve disliked Bob Carver’s products for years based on their questionable sound quality, but I was close to getting a Sunfire. The Sunfire really seems to be a good product with good sound and unreal power. But what it has got in power, it doesn’t have in bass quality or midrange resolution. I don’t think the Sunfire is more dynamic than the 3B-ST, but it will play louder and will drive more problematic speakers than the Bryston. But then Apogee doesn’t make 1 Ohm speakers any more, nor does Infinity make those Kappa 9 amp eaters either, so that point is moot for most people. And I’ve never heard of a transferable twenty-year warranty on a piece of electronics. And, most importantly, the Bryston still seems to be just a notch down in sound quality to the Levinson gear that I still can’t afford.

Transparent, dynamic, detailed -yet sweet

None -when combined with a B60 for the tweeters

ROBERT JONES
01-05-14 11:20 AM

To: LOUIS LESSARD/ACDI-CIDA/G_C/CA@ACDI-CIDA
cc: DAVE BOYD/ACDI-CIDA/G_C/CA@ACDI-CIDA
Subject: Draft for Audio review re: Bryston: Comments

Its been a long time coming but, a change is gona come.

When I got into serious hi-fi because of the emergence of CD playback, I ended-up getting a LINN turntable and some LINN and NAIM electronics. I must admit that around the time of the purchase of the NAIM I did listen to a BRYSTON 2B and loved it. But, according to reviewers their equipment was suppose to sound harsh and after all they were Canadian and, how could something from Canada compete against the 'motherland'!

Well, for years I have always felt that my system was dry and lifeless, specifically non-envolving. The system is based around the LINN Sara 9 speakers, Wakonda pre-amp and LP 12/Sondek. Different power amps have done duties over the years. Now, we all now that it couldn't be blamed on the SONDEK!

When a friend purchased a BRYSTON integrated B60 and was invited over to listen, I was amazed at the sound and it gave me the opportunity to again give BRYSTON a fair try. With his cooperation the BRYSTON found its way into my system under different confirgations. The best combination was the B60 acting as a pre-amp while driving the tweeters and a LINN powertek for the mid-range/woofers. The result was a big step up, very enjoyable and involving.

Not done yet we borrowed a BRYSTON 3B from the local dealer. After different combinations, we again settled on the B60 for the pre-amp and tweeters but, with the 3B for the mid-range/woofers.

MAGICAL. The best of both worlds. The sweet, airy sound of the B60 and the control, detail and quickness of the 3B.
My Saras came to life and, when we transferred to his residence, his Spendors S3/5 sang like never before. Instead of using all the well known adjectives, we both agreed that everything was right. The music was dynamic, controlled, detailed and a focused and holographic soundstage was produced. And, just as important given their past reputation, no matter how loud we set the volume AT NO TIME DID IT GET HARSH.

In my quest for a more involving sound, I had been listening to, among others, the new NAIM 5 series and various tube electronics. I am now convinced that the BRYSTON has got it right, especially if we combine the best of both their strengths. Yes, the 'tubes' make everything sound nice but, accurate I don't know. The B60 on the tweeters gives you the air and sweetness while the 3B gives you the best of the rest.

They say our reference should be live, unamplified music. That's fine but, for me it would be to be in the studio when the music is being made. With the BRYSTON combination I felt like I was listening in on the studio/recording session. If this is what reviewers mean by transparency, then it was A+ by me.

If you have a B60, you more than owe it to yourselves to borrow a 3B and passively bi-amp. Get your credit card ready, because once you do you won't be able to go for long without ordering one. My friend is saving and I have put my electronics for sale to buy BRYSTON.

Given the implication for and of the 3B, I plan on posting this review under its namesake.

Similar Products Used:

LINN, NAIM, Rotel

"the best driver in town" -- will drive fast slowest speakers, warranty and bryston service, soundstage, no noise, well designed power circuit that does not require using power plants or conditioners, good channel separation makes this amplifier sound like two monoblocks.

ugly, sounds a little "agressive" (good drivers are always a little bit agressive), due to massive unit production, this amp has a large depreciation.

I would recommend Bryston amps to drive most of the speakers available. If you're tired to match amp with your speakers probably Bryston line is your solution. I had a problem with my Vandersteens 1c (the fastest speakers of that line but still very slow). Despite their great sound resolution, they have ability to "hold" the sound longer than it was originally. That sound delay most likely will not be heard listening to big bands or any orchestral music.
If you're to small bands or solo players -- that is where it takes place. Plugging them with Bryston made them totally different: every fast stakkatto note from the piano virtuoso Vladimir Ashkenazi was heard clear and bright; clear channel separation made the small band sound a real stage picture.
I've bought this unit new due to a number of circuitry improvements to even more reduce THX (from 0.003% to 0.0009%), but I would recommend to wait a little bit and by it used or demo due to a big depreciation.

Similar Products Used:

Creek 52, Belles 150.