Rega Brio-R
- Thread starter Art K.
- Start date
ictwoody
I like vintage gear — my preamp is from 2007.
Pythonman
Active Member
I have been enjoying my Brio-R for almost a year now and have gotten used to the depth and width of the soundstage it presents. It truly possesses a balanced set of strenghs in most respects and dazzles with loads of details and air and spatial cues. Over the weekend I took some very familiar CDs over to a friends house who owns some McIntosh MC501 monoblocks and an Aragon preamp. His speakers are rated to handle the 500 watt Mac amps unquestionably. You would think I was going to be mightily impressed by the monster audiophile setup. You would be wrong. What his setup did that mine cant do is control the woofers with an iron fist. By that I mean his setup had major slam and impact and punch. And that was the single thing his setup did better than mine. The rest wasn't even close. No sense of 3D imaging, no bags of air and space, hardly half the details I'm used to hearing, and no boogie factor or rhythm and pace to speak of. The Mac setup was very clinical and dry and big and punchy and loud. When I got home and cued up a disc I'd just heard at his house and hit play it was almost jarring how much more information and depth I was hearing again. And there was no loss in the scale of size of images through the Brio-R to speak of even if it didn't have the powerhouse low end smack the 90lb apiece monoblocks had! IDK, but the Rega engineers have some serious good taste when voicing their components and the Brio-R is living proof of it IMO. A true audiophile piece in every way imaginable!
How do the x12's compare to the Audience 42's? And how would the brio do driving the 42's?
Well, this is my 2nd post....
Having read through most of this thread, I realise I'm a little late to the Brio party.
My current system is lossless files played through a Beresford Caiman dac via an Airport Express through an Audiolab 8000S amp feeding Dynaudio Audience 42 speakers on atacama stands. All very nice. Or it was until my amp lost a channel just recently.
Oh, I also have a rega planar 2 and a mk1 mini fono amp that I use very occasionally.
So, I need to repair or replace. Repair could cost around £150.
I'm tempted to replace it to be honest and since my budget is around the 4 to 500 £ mark I have obviously stumbled upon the Brio R. Picking one up 2nd hand would be fine and could save me some money too. I bought my Audiolab amp 2nd hand for £400; half the price of a new one back then, so I got a lot of amp for the money.
How would the Brio R fair against the 8000S? The Audiolab sound is nice and clean, good midrange (i think) but a little harsh at the top end when I crank it up, so an amp with a touch more warmth would be good.
The speakers are 4ohm and I can't afford to be changing this at the moment.
Thoughts? Should I be waiting for Brio R version 2.0?
Oh, and I'm uk based.
Having read through most of this thread, I realise I'm a little late to the Brio party.
My current system is lossless files played through a Beresford Caiman dac via an Airport Express through an Audiolab 8000S amp feeding Dynaudio Audience 42 speakers on atacama stands. All very nice. Or it was until my amp lost a channel just recently.
Oh, I also have a rega planar 2 and a mk1 mini fono amp that I use very occasionally.
So, I need to repair or replace. Repair could cost around £150.
I'm tempted to replace it to be honest and since my budget is around the 4 to 500 £ mark I have obviously stumbled upon the Brio R. Picking one up 2nd hand would be fine and could save me some money too. I bought my Audiolab amp 2nd hand for £400; half the price of a new one back then, so I got a lot of amp for the money.
How would the Brio R fair against the 8000S? The Audiolab sound is nice and clean, good midrange (i think) but a little harsh at the top end when I crank it up, so an amp with a touch more warmth would be good.
The speakers are 4ohm and I can't afford to be changing this at the moment.
Thoughts? Should I be waiting for Brio R version 2.0?
Oh, and I'm uk based.
Art K.
The Voodoo You Do!
I don't know the answers to any of those questions. I never owned the Audience 42. By most accounts it's more difficult to drive than the Excite series. Never owned the Audiolab. We'll have to wait and see with the next Brio. Note: The Heed Audio Elixir is a very capable amp for about the same money...it really is good.
Well the heed is £750 here while the brio is £550 but available used for much less.
Twiddler
Member
If the Heed and the Brio were the same price which one would you chose?
sonci
Well-Known Member
Is this the quality of new amplifiers?
I bought my first amplifier in '89, it still works ok!
davelarz
Well-Known Member
Hello all - thought I'd chime in on this epic thread as a new Brio-R owner (who consulted this thread a few times in the decision to acquire said Brio). I recently decided to trade the SX-850 in my avatar for the Brio-R (guess I need to change my avatar...). It was a difficult decision - I'd had that 850 restored and was really attached to it, aesthetically loved it dearly. But it continued to have issues even after the restore, and I was using it in an office system where it was just a beast spacewise. When I got the offer to trade it for the Brio-R, after reading all of the Brio's many rave reviews, I decided it was time to move on. I was admittedly very anxious that I was making a decision I would regret, felt like I might be trading a unit with great soul for a disposable and soulless sliver of black plastic modernity.
All of that anxiety was dispelled, literally, with my first listen to the Brio. Sonny Rollins' The Bridge on vinyl. 30 seconds into "without a song" and I was aware that I had moved into a different arena of hi-fi with this piece. The detail and spatial presentation is stunning, even in a space as small and awkward as my office. I'm also just amazed by the phono stage - unbelievably quiet. I get absolute silence at any volume with phono selected. It's making my workingman's sl-1600 sound like a pretty serious deck.
As has been often noted before the cramped rear panel is annoying and mine runs pretty warm driving KLH 17's. I have maybe 25 hours on it now and though I'm aware of a forward presentation, I can't say it's bothering me in any way, and I am usually very sensitive to high-end sizzle. Could be the fact that I am primarily playing vinyl and that the decidedly rolled-off East Coast sound of the 17's is a good match. But... well look if it needs as much break-in as people here have said then I'm in for a treat, because I think it sounds great now.
Bottom line for me - though I guess it depends on where you're coming from, but it's hard for me to imagine being disappointed with this unit for the price. And if you're swapping this in for a massive 70's receiver, well, let me tell you... opens up a lot of shelf space...
All of that anxiety was dispelled, literally, with my first listen to the Brio. Sonny Rollins' The Bridge on vinyl. 30 seconds into "without a song" and I was aware that I had moved into a different arena of hi-fi with this piece. The detail and spatial presentation is stunning, even in a space as small and awkward as my office. I'm also just amazed by the phono stage - unbelievably quiet. I get absolute silence at any volume with phono selected. It's making my workingman's sl-1600 sound like a pretty serious deck.
As has been often noted before the cramped rear panel is annoying and mine runs pretty warm driving KLH 17's. I have maybe 25 hours on it now and though I'm aware of a forward presentation, I can't say it's bothering me in any way, and I am usually very sensitive to high-end sizzle. Could be the fact that I am primarily playing vinyl and that the decidedly rolled-off East Coast sound of the 17's is a good match. But... well look if it needs as much break-in as people here have said then I'm in for a treat, because I think it sounds great now.
Bottom line for me - though I guess it depends on where you're coming from, but it's hard for me to imagine being disappointed with this unit for the price. And if you're swapping this in for a massive 70's receiver, well, let me tell you... opens up a lot of shelf space...
Art K.
The Voodoo You Do!
It's not ideal but between it and the Creek 4330 I have they really get a lot of the goody from the ATC's.
Spektre
Brit alert
Hey Art, I've not been keeping abreast of all the latest stuff you've had but I caught this thread and saw you have some ATC's and a Creek amp?
Two questions; how do the ATC's differ from the Harbeth, and how are you finding the Creek?
Incidently, I've been in the UK dealing with my fathers estate the last couple of years and I'm hoping to come back stateside, probably won't be Oregon though
Art K.
The Voodoo You Do!
Hi Gavin...
The Harbeths have a bigger sound and deeper bass due to the ported design. Both speakers are incredibly natural sounding. The ATC's have a more detailed bass and the tweeter is very refined sounding without a bit of fatigue. The ATC's level of resolution at the price point, though that is not low, is remarkable. I am getting divorced and moving to a condo so I am selling the Harbeth's. I'll update my signature soon.
The Harbeths have a bigger sound and deeper bass due to the ported design. Both speakers are incredibly natural sounding. The ATC's have a more detailed bass and the tweeter is very refined sounding without a bit of fatigue. The ATC's level of resolution at the price point, though that is not low, is remarkable. I am getting divorced and moving to a condo so I am selling the Harbeth's. I'll update my signature soon.
Spektre
Brit alert
I'm very sorry to hear about your personal situation Art, thats what I went through 2 years ago, I feel you pain.
Back to audio related matters. I've fancied trying a pair of ATC's, the build on them seems to be high. Even here in the UK they dealers are hard to find to get a demo, is this what you did before buying? The 11's are infinite baffle yes?
emollerstuen
New Member
Anyone have any experience running a Brio-R in Japan? I just moved here and have been running it directly off of the 100V outlet but would like to get a proper voltage converter to feed it 115V. I have noticed a periodic hum/buzz from the speakers with only the amp turned and my dealer back in the states agrees it is likely from being fed low voltage.
Power consumption on the Brio-R is rated at 195W and I've read people suggest doubling that when shopping for a voltage converter. With that in mind I came across this 1000W step-up transformer (100V to 115V) on Amazon JP and am thinking of ordering:
https://www.amazon.co.jp/変圧器工房-ステップ...coding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=HR2A3XDGGCF3WP6AFNNE
Any thoughts or additional recommendations? Thanks!
Power consumption on the Brio-R is rated at 195W and I've read people suggest doubling that when shopping for a voltage converter. With that in mind I came across this 1000W step-up transformer (100V to 115V) on Amazon JP and am thinking of ordering:
https://www.amazon.co.jp/変圧器工房-ステップ...coding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=HR2A3XDGGCF3WP6AFNNE
Any thoughts or additional recommendations? Thanks!
