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Cyrus CD6 followup

Posted by longtimequadowner (A) on June 6, 2005 at 14:50:11

This is just a followup to a post on speaker asylum, hope you catch this nathan_klassen!

I am currently evaluating both a Cyrus CD6 and Creek CD50 mk2 inhouse, and as of the first few hours of playing these boxes, I was not impressed to say the least. After a minimum of 24 hours burnin (with a burnin disk supplied by SCE audio with my SCE Harmonic Recovery System), I gave the Cyrus CD6 another try, so I'll do a mini-review here. It got a lot better now that there's probably about 36 hours on it, all told.

Initially - out of the box, the CD6 was darkish, slow, trodding it's way mechannically through music. Nothing could be more opposite my experience with Cyrus, I had a Mission Cyrus 1 amp with my Quad ESL 57's in the mid to late 1980's and selling that was the dumbest audio move I ever made, short of selling that pair of quads too. I didn't know then that particular Cyrus unit was hot-rodded by the previous owner, because two subsequent Cyrus 1 amps I tried with my Quad 57's burst into flames - literally - both on the same night, after about 30 seconds of play. What they say about Quad 57 impedance is true! I still have the CD player I had then, the Denon DCD-1500.

Anyway, now 15 years later my local dealer has a cyrus sitting on his shelf - I almost fell over when I first saw them, a CD6, Intergated 6vs and 8vs. Joy! I took it home Friday, have it until Tuesday morning, so I have to whip through this fast - time is valuable.

After the first 36 hours of burning, this is starting to sound like my all time favorite solid state amp, and the only one I've truly loved (except the Quad 303 when playing with Quad 57's which I'm currently using) my long lost mission Cyrus 1. So let's get to it.

Having had such a horrible listening experience with the Cyrus and Creek the first 24 hours, I decided to yank the passive Creek OBH-12 (awesome little pre) and put in my classic, 1962, triode design Heathit AA-11 preamp. This pre loses no information, but adds presence and dimensionality to say the least - plus, I really need bass control in my room and this has it, and believe me I use it. I'm a baaaad audiophile.

Once I listened to the Cyrus this morning, and found that the heavy darkness and slowness it exhibited yesterday were largely gone, I put it on 4 sorbothane feet, put some weight on top of it, and decided to play all the old CD's I used to listen to when I had my original Cyrus 1, just for a trip down memory lane, and an embarrasing one to have to write about, but I wanted to hear my old Cyrus. And, I don't ever want a CD player so good I can't listen to and love even the oldest digital - 1980's style - I'll never be that much of an audiophile!

So, disk 1 - the "Meat Puppets" - ablum "Up on the Sun". This album sounds absolutely horrible if your CD player can't carry a tune - it requires pace, rhythym, timing, and some high end sparkle. Without those, it's not offensive, just boring - you just don't get it. My Cyrus 1 loved this disk. Well, so does the CD6 - it had me condicting the "orchestra" at very high speed (required for this album's pace), and PRaT? It has me conducting the left/right guitars with my left/right hands, and the bass with my feet - and believe me, I'm not that co-ordinated. Only the Quads can synchronize my cerebral cortex this way, and only when fed properly. Despite being SICK of listening and evaluating CD sound the last couple days, I listened to this one beginning to end - I put down the remote - and there's been many a time in the last 15 years I couldn't reproduce this album, believe me - it's a bitch.

I'm cheating a bit though, because this album's bass is a couple octaves higher than most and of the acoustic variety - but it's that definition that the Cyrus 1 amp so excelled at, and was the reason I came to love this album and realize how much there is to "miss" in the upper bass regions - the CD6 did not disappoint. Damn near brought a nostalgic tear to my eye. Beyond that though, this album is a very good test of channel separation and co-ordination, it has some pixie-dust sparkle it spreads swinging from left to right channel, just to make you swoon - the CD6 did just as I remembered it. It also has cavernous atmosphere on many cuts, all there. Perhaps most importantly, it could do it all at once.

Disk 2 - Meat Puppets II (their second album I presume). One sign that I'm having a great musical night (well, morning in this case) is that as soon as 1 album is about to end, I start thiking of all the other albums like it I want to play next - and what's more like the MP's than more MP's? So, continuing my trip down memory lane, I played this album pretty much start to finish (skipping only the songs I skipped back then). It was lovely - nice stereophonic acoustic bass that is slightly out of time in the L/R channels, thereby making it run the spread of the room and make it almost like wearing headphones.

Disk 3 - Wolfgang Press, "Standing Up Straight" - although in similar sonic territory to the Meat Puppets, light with cavernous atmosphere and a fair amount of upper-register bass definition, this is a dark brooding album that has some really cavernous depth and drama. It is very much of the "industrial music" variety (like Skinny Puppy back in the day, etc) and can be very offensive if not played just right. Again, the player has to be albe to carry a tune. The original Cyrus had a politeness that almost tended towards dryness that kept things very listenable - and the same here, but less dry (albeit through my tube preamp). Somehow Cyrus does this without seeming to lose any definition and detail, a very sly trick. It too requires sparkle as well - something I'd think you'd lose with a certain level of polite-ness, but not so - it sparkled.

Disk 4 - Wolfgang Press, "The Legendary Wolfgang Press and other Tall Stories". Again, it's a good sign when you're listening to albums you're long tired of and want to hear a 2nd from the same artist as soon as the first ends, but there you go - having a good music morning for sure. This album is somewhat less industrial and has a lot more sprinkling of beautiful sparkling acoustic riffs/melodies on top of an industrial base, often still with cavernous spaces. All the little things I remember and have never heard as nicely since are still there - 2nd song "Tremble (my girl doesn't)" has an acoustic guitar chord that starts in the center and radiates outward ablmost blowing your hair as it passes - no problemo. And my back-in-the day all time favorite quad/cyrus "demo song" - "Fireeater", is still enough to make people say "how do they (the quads) DO that?"

Disk 5 - staying nostalgic - a heavier industrial album that's really grippping, but sick - it was just too early in the morning and too late in my life, Butthole Surfurs - won't mention the title, had to skip this ablum. Maybe I'll try their album "Hairway to Steven" soon, they have a couple others too.

Disk 6 - The kings of soundspace in the day - The Residents "Our Tired, Our Poor, Our Huddled Masses". Avonte Guarde experimental music - but again the CD6 captured the sickly musical lines against the bigger picture very nicely. Wish I could have used more volume - but all the little things going on all at once are brought present and forward for you to see clearly, never offending yet with nice definition, and more importantly serve the music with what seems like exactly the futuristic clockwork orange type feel that the artists surely intended. Made me want to listen to the Resident's "God in 3 Persons" right after - really a monolog backed by music - but quite dramatic, like sinking into a storybook - but one of the tubes on my old AA-11 pre is getting spitty, so time to shut it down for now.

Ok, so the bad news is that when there is even slightly deep bass it is still seems like the Cyrus is stepping through mud - robbing it of the "light bouncy sound" it exhibits without it - and the Cyrus 1 used to be able to carry that level of bass definition right through the entire bass range, and keep it bouncy and light, and back in it's space where it belongs - but remember, this is after a mere 36 hours breakin at most, and I'd suspect the fatty bass is the last symptom to go over time. If it turns out to be able to dupliate that old feat, it will be a killer. The old cyrus always had me conducting bass lines with my feet separately from my hands conducting the rest of the "orchestra" at rapid speed. Remember too I'm putting it through a classic tube pre with rather oldish tubes, but I doubt that's the problem right now.

So Nathan, don't leave this one off your shortlist! It somehow manages to be non-offensive through the entire range - almost "polite" yet with high definition and plenty of sparkle, never irritating highs (although remember my tube pre), and very addictive bass definition in the upper bass registers. Below that I can't say yet, but I doubt Cyrus left it like it's sounding now. More importantly, it can do all these things at once - it can carry a tune - and has PRaT. If the lower registers clear up, this one's a keeper. Given the nature of the 1980's digital I used it with, you can rest assured it can only get better - but I want to be able to use ALL my collection.

I may still plug in the Creek tonight, but if I'm running out of tubes so I don't know that I'll be swayed - it has been running for probably 48 hours now. Plus, the CD6 can later accept an outboard power supply, and can be upgraded to CD8 at the factory - although I wonder if it's necessary. Their DAC-X is outrageously expensive, but it's out there too. You know, sometimes the lower priced products can boogie better. I remember one guy on this board saying he used an older Cyrus 8 integrated amp with his Quad 57's with great success though, although he did blow a panel once that way - so I can't test the Cyrus 6 integrated for fear it may blow up, or my speakers may.

As for me, I'm going to listen as long as I can, then I guess I'll have to replay all these on my old Denon, and maybe on the Creek too. Don't relish hering it all again quite frankly, but I'll do my best after a few hours break. I won't be back online for a few hours probably, time is valuable right now, when the clock strikes midnight it's all over, these have to go back Tuesday.

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