Solid bass, lots of reserve power. Solid build, 20 year no questions transferable warranty - itself worth $$$$.

None.

While in this price range you will get many fellow audiophiles stating they do not care for Bryston's sound, at this caliber I believe it becomes a matter of taste. In addition I think it strongly matters what speakers you pair it with (in my case Magnapan's 3.6s). You'll note also that Bryston is usually only criticized when compared to amps costing far more (Krell and the like.) I have had my 4B for over 10 years and still love it. It has terrific bottom end that can fully scoop up the low notes, and fairly warm mids and highs. I'll agree there are amps available with slightly less grainy mids but I do not agree that Bryston's amps cannot be transparent. My Bryston's amp and pre-amp only failure over the last decade was a power switch, which they gladly fixed (and rechecked the entire amp while they had it). Great service. There is a reason Bryston has a great following - high-end sound without the high-end headaches or stratospheric prices. Strongly recommend.

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Big bass Effortless power (250 WPC) enough to last through any speaker upgrade I make. The best warrantee in the industry Canadian made

wonky binding posts (SST was much better) you have to use bannanas power button was a little crooked?

I stopped by my local dealer yesterday to have a listen to the 4B ST,4B SST and 3B SST. I listened with a pair of Paradign Studio 40's, Musical Fidelity A3 CD player and Pre. My dealer is really good, and they usually let me sit by myself with my CDs and go to town and exactly what I did. The 4B ST was a fantastic sound and the price they offered me was great as well. All the amps had effortless response and great bass as well and smooth, slightly forward highs. The SST amps had a more "open" sound and the 4B SST in particular had a real power over the woofers. I was amazed at the bass that all the amps produced. This is saying a lot for the Studio 40's as well because thay are monitor sized speakers. I would recomend an audition of any of the Prardigm Studio series. They are some of the best bargains in audio. I can not wait to see how the Signature series sounds! I listened for about an hour to each and afterwards I decided on the 4B ST. I just couldn't see that big of a difference between the SST and the ST. There were differences mind you but they were slight. At $1600 (Canadian) dollars cheaper for the 4B ST, that's the amp I decided on. It's a fantastic amp for the money and has 18 years left on the warrantee! I'll write an updated review once I get the amp home into my own system. I can't wait!

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MF

Wonderful silence between notes. Great macro and micro dynamics. World-class bass. Sweet, detailed highs. Gorgeous mids. Very deep and stable image. VERY revealing of front-end componants. Balanced and single ended inputs. Vastly improved speaker binding posts. Sonically equal to most of the world-class amps now. Build quality and reliability exceeds all but a handful of products at any price.

Heavy. If you are not physically fit get a friend to help you place the amp.

This review is for the new SST series of amplifiers. My amp is the 4BSST, a 300watt @8ohm and 600watt @4ohm monster of an amp (although it is only the middle-amp of the product line.)Front end is the Levinson 390s cd-player through the Bryston BP-25 pre-amp, and direct to the amp. Speakers are Newform Research Ribbon/Hybrid. The store I bought this from gave me a loaner of the earlier 4BST series until my amp came in.I hooked up the new amp and right out of the box the improvement was immediate and obvious. The soundstage had the subtlety of placement that previously only belonged to the Pass amps. The midrange was much more coherant than the earlier model Bryston, now up there with the creme del la creme of Solid State amps. Every instrument was a thing unto itself with none of the sonic smearing and grit that I was used to with SS amps. Its midrange is much smoother and grain-free IMHO than the smaller Krells. While not able to make bad cd's sound good,this amp does nothing make such a cd sound worse. On my speakers the soundstage is not a reach-out-and-get-you one; it is laid out more to the rear of the speakers filling the room to the back corners with very little projecting in front of the speakers. The speakers do,of course, disappear. It is not an enveloping type of soundstage (darn!). That kind of soundstage is reserved for the OTL tube amps. While the amp has plenty of power,and explosive dynamics, its laid-back image character may not be the cup of tea for Rockers who want a more up-front, in-your-face characteristic. I took the SST to the Levinson dealer and directly compared it to the new Levinsons. They were very, very close; the Levinson having a slightly leaner presentation with very slightly more detailed highs, the Bryston having a slightly more robust and fuller midrange. Both could resolve complex passages with ease. They Bryston seemed a tad better in the Bass. Both sounded refined and effortless. (The comparison did cause me to buy the Levinson 390s cd player!) A word on the BP-25 pre-amp; the sonic signature is virtually undetectable. The sound of the 390s cd-player direct to the amp and through the BP-25 was vitually identical. Any percieved brightness reported by others is from elswhere in the system. Same goes for the 4BSST. If you percieve brightness change your cables or cd-player. If you want warm, get a tube preamp; be aware though that you are using the tube linestage as a tone control. No need to spend big bucks on interconnect; use the Bryston balanced cable and you are set for life. The Bryston does very much like the JPS AC power cord ($150 bucks but worth it); there is more apparent power and an even quieter noise floor. (I am still trying to figure out how the power cord can do that!) A great, great product,and don't forget the 20year warranty! (Even before the 20year warranty I have never known anyone to PAY for a repair on a Bryston.)

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Power, Liquidity,nice bloom in the midrange

not perfect more of an "iron fist" than a "silk glove" but it still has some refined qualities

This amplifier Is a solid performer, there are no overt problems with it. It's not "amazingly refined" but that can't be achieved unless you spend alot more money. For the price you get a powerful amplifier that sounds good, is fairly transparent, has a nice "liquidity" about and just all around sounds good. You can get it upgraded from ModHi-Fi.com for a good price if you are a more "audiophile" oriented consumer. I personally own two, one for housewide audio and an upgraded one for dedicated stereo system. A great buy when purchased used, buy one.. or two, you'll be happy you did.

Tons of power Virtually indestructable Built to last

I swear it has lead weights inside!!!

Holy SH|T I just had to tell people about the amps I've been using at this night club I DJ at. The owner bought 2 of these old beat up SH|TTYlooking power amps. They were so scratched up and rusted that you could barely read the name "4Bryston" on the front. I decided to hook em up in an attempt to blow them up and make my boss buy newer better amps. Those Canadians built one hell of an amp!!!. I tried loading it down to 1/2 ohm, running it so hot you couldn't touch it, butting out my smokes on it, spilling drinks on it, and cranking on it till the clip lights almost ran solid red!!!!! HELP ME I CAN'T KILL THE F#CKERS!!! Cheers to the guys at Bryston for making a workhorse of an amp you could drop 3 stories up and still use it.

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soundstage power clear prise 20 year

no

best for rock 5+++=20 year garn

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classe and bryston for the prise

If it can stand the abuse I put my older 4B's thru, it will last forever in a home theater setting, and still impress your guests. Meant for the listener who needs a raw high output amp.

If you like to pull your kakhies up to your armpits, sit in your easy chair, sip your port and listen to classical, then save up for a small krell.

I purchased this amplifyer to be the backbone of my home theater. It runs my NHT VT-2 towers. I have used bryston amps for many years in moble sound, and live sound set ups. the 4B's I use for work have been abused, dropped, spilled on, and have never let me down. They are a genuine workhorse. Tons of power and responce even when loaded down. At home It pours out sound at good quality and very loud volumes.

Tons of clean power. 20 year warranty. Looks. Very real presentation. Did I mention tons of clean power?

Not a weakness. So revealing that not only will you hear good things that you never heard before, but bad things on a poorly produced or mixed inputs--like cd's with the highs and lows jacked up to compensate for inferior equipment. Like all equipment, some fine tuning is necessary. At first the Bryston sounded a touch bright at the highest frequencies. Switching from Toslink to a decent digital coax solved the problem and really improved the overall sound. Repeat after me(credit Jon), Toslink Sucks.

Here are my initial impressions. 1)immediatly noticed smooooother high frequency response. ACDC-Back in Black-vocals much more liquid...not harsh anymore...very dramatic. 2)center fill much stronger...soundstage, left to right, completely filled in...no weak spots...not that I noticed any weakness prior, it's just apparent now!!! 3)slightly better transparency and staging beyond speakers. 4)Bass control very noticable on demanding cuts. Case in point: Eagles-Victim of Love, has very strong bass line and heavy impact percussion. Rock solid at the low end...very easy to hear dramatic improvement. 5)imaging is still a question mark...not sure if better...more listening is in order...at least as good as it was before. 6)musicality...thumbs up in a big way..no doubt tremendous improvement. Liquid is the only way I can describe it...not syrupy...not too warm, though warmer than the Yami...somewhat silky, yet defined presentation...involving, non-fatiguing, NICE! 7)depth-more listening required, but better than before. 8)Power, power ,power. Drives the speakers with unbelievable ease. No strain, ample reserves very apparent. Comparison to Yami-none-not even close. 9)Now I understand what "bloom" is!! System: Yamaha RX-V793 as pre out Bryston 4B ST Luminous Audio interconnects Toshiba SD 2700 cd/dvd Monster M1000-D coax B&W 603s2 mains B&W LCR6s2 center Yamaha A2836 surrounds Klipsch KSW 12 sub(movies only) Monster Cable to all speakers Mitsi VCR Sony 48" RPG And last, most importantly, about $250 in DIY room treatments--6 bass traps and 4 reflective/absorptive panels. I would also like to thank Jon Gale for his considerable input on room setup and acoustic treatment. You may find him to be an excellent resource. His website is--http://ic.net/~jtgale/. Happy listening!

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No experience with individual components. Have used Yamaha, Kenwood, Sansui, Harmon Kardon, etc...

clean,powerful and uncoloured sound. A strong 5 star for the price.

slightly hard with vocal.Good preamp is a MUST.

Very good performance /value ratio. Needs to pair with a good preamp( not BP25! it sounded harsh and cold). An excellent power amplifier by it's own.

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classe, sunfire, rotel, adcom, plinius...

every aspect

none

Realism, Accuracy, Dependability Only levinson and Krell compare.

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