Opera Consonance Cyber20

Cyber-20 is the first high-end vacuum tube headphone amplifier produced by Opera Audio. It uses two EL84 connected in triode mode single end operation being driven by a single 12AU7. A separate power supply using LC filtering is being used. All connections are by point-to-point wiring. Worth mentioning is, Cyber-20 is the first vacuum tube headphone amplifier in China that uses an output transformer. The selectable output impedance of the output transformer is done by a switch at the front panel. With this switch the amplifier can adapt to headphone having impedance ranging from 10 to 600 ohm. This enable high-end headphone user getting choices over many different headphone in the market. Dual headphone output makes it easy for two listeners to enjoy the music together under the same conditions for easy comparison. The top of Cyber-20 is covered with African solid rose wood. With its cute outlook and small size, an ideal compliment to its warm, transparent and powerful musical performance.

I have written this before, and may write it again: It is a good time to be a headphone-ophile. A case in point is the Consonance Cyber 20 made by the Opera Audio Co. Ltd. In Beijing , China . Late one afternoon, a compact and heavy box arrived at my office via the Brown-truck man, and the return address tipped me off that it was the headphone amp I had recently volunteered to review.

Specification

• Control Functions: Volume, Gain (low/high) Switch, Power On/Off
• Output Impedance: (low) 10-200 ohms , (high) 200-600 ohms
• Output Power at 1 kHz: 1W x2 RMS
• Bandwidth at -3dB: 20Hz - 40kHz (1W)
• Signal / Noise: 90dB
• Input Interfaces: 1 group (RCA)
• Input Impedance: 50k
• Input Sensitivity for Rated Output: 900mV
• Output Interfaces: 2 groups (6.5mm Mic Jack)
• Consumption: 26W
• Vacuum Tube: EL84x2, ECC82x1
• Dimension: 190 (L) x 145 (W) x 112(H) mm
• Weight: 9kg (packed)