Cyrus amps - what do they sound like?

mmm, Great Britain ?

Thanks seandtaylor99. Are they less colored than Naim? That was my big problem with Naim, although I loved the dynamics. Sdcampbell I got enthused about this amp after reading about it in Whathifi?. They said the Creek 5350 was a four star, very good amp but the Cyrus was much better. The crown jewel of England? So I was interested in what people here thought.
As I mentioned, I liked they dynamics of Naim but could not live with this amp because of the colorations. It wasn't till I switched to Jeff Roland that instruments sounded like themselves. That was too pricey so I got Musical Fidelity. But they tend to sound smooth and somewhat dull albeit with low coloration, distortion, and good transparency. Better for classical orchestra than rock music.
One dealer had an interesting way to evaluate a stereo. he said listen for two things. First how natural and uncolored the sound was. Second listen for PRAT, I think. He said if you get these two things right, you could satisfy most listeners no matter where they were in the room.
Soundorganisation is importing this amp and they are lining up dealers. Only one in VA right now. I'd want to know what they will do for service if they break.
The add-on power supply seems like a marketing gimmick to me. I mean, if you buy it, you are in effect paying for 2 power supplies (one in ther original amp) and 2 cases, power cords, RCA's etc. They could probably just put a better power supply in their existing box (make a standard size box) for half the cost of what they are selling the external power supply for.

I had at one point the Cyrus 1 (plastic casing) and eventually also had a Cyrus 2 with the PSX (metal casings).
I really like the way they sound. I think they're up to the Cyrus 40000000000000000000000000 around this time, on which I have no opinion never having heard it.

The 2 is more refined and tighter bottom end than the 1. Not as warm as other Brit stuff (Audiolab, Meridian...) but still quite good.

They are up to Cyrus 8vs.

I don't think that they're colored. They are, however, very dynamic, and bursting with energy. Very enjoyable.

The add-on power supply was, in my opinion an extremely well thought out design, especially if you use the builtin (and very good) phono preamp. When the PSX was connected to my cyrus 2 the internal power supply powered only the phono preamp. With the newer gear I think it powers the microcontroller and remote stuff, leaving the PSX to power the audio stages.

I also remember that the Cyrus PSXs sold for a lot less than the (ridiculously priced) Naim power supplies. In fact we took my PSX apart and found that the selling price was roughly equal to the parts cost (admitedly Cyrus sources in quantity at lower cost ... but I still thought it was a good deal).

I remember comparing a Cyrus 2 with PSX (total cost about 800 GBP at the time) with an Audiolab 8000Q and 2 8000M monoblocks, through KEF 103.4 reference speakers. None of us could hear the difference, even though the audiolab gear (itself considered good value) cost nearly twice as much as the cyrus gear. The cyrus 2 with a PSX supply was a real piledriver of an amp ... in fact it had way more power than I could ever use. My only criticism was I never got the volume past 9 oclock, so channel balance could be off at low volumes on the volume pot.

If I were in the market for an integrated amp (I'm not .. I like my Densen B100) I'd certainly have the cyrus at the top of the list. If I had sensitive speakers and or a smallish room I wouldn't bother with the PSX. If I had difficult speakers (low impedance current suckers) or a big room, I'd budget for the PSX.