This is a review written by Terry Ellis December 2024.

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New in many ways

I was given the task to be the worlds first HiFi reviewer to put UK based Cyrus Audio’s brand new 40 series HiFi products to the test and that forced me to do something I have not done in over a decade, listen to a CD in a CD player.

Cyrus Audio turned 40 this year and in honour of that they have released a new flagship range of products called the 40 series and there are four new products in the 40 series, with one of them being a CD player called the 40 CD. I was a very early adopter to computer based music playback which is still playing CD’s in a lot of instances but CD’s that have been ripped to digital storage of some sort.  So this has been a fun review to revisit the CD player and I wasn’t sure how I would feel about it, but it ended up being a very impactful time for how I feel about the silver disc.

Touch of glass

I was very impressed when I first saw the new Cyrus 40 CD, with its a very different design to anything I have seen from Cyrus before. The new form factor is still using a classic Cyrus half width sized chassis but from any angle and especially the top down you can appreciate how new the new overall form factor all the 40 series have. I find it an interesting way to design HiFi as its quite an industrial look but still homely.  What you cannot see in photos is how the product feels in your hands, the chassis is formed aluminium and the rear section with all the lines and grooves feels particularly good to hold as it adds a lot of solidity.  This helps the 40 CD feel more robust as a very solid built thing, especially as its not very heavy.

Lets face it most people will place their HiFi into some kind of rack or furniture and then all you see is the front and that is where Cyrus have really moved things on. The front I think has a very nice profile massively helped by it being toughened glass. The glass I think adds a touch of quality or luxury because of how light reflects off it, different to metal or plastic.  It also allows for a very nice implementation of a touch sensitive power button top left which I think is my favourite part of the design, and how It glows when you power on, rather than flash, it’s a nicer way to do it. I am also a fan of the black and white text colour scheme as white really pops off a black background and black will disappear for you when the lights are dimmed for having a serious listening session.

The 3.5 inch screen is apparently colour but you only ever see white text, but you can tell it’s a high-res screen by how crisp the text is. Its also bloody bright if you want it to be, in the menu you can control the brightness of the screen independent to the brightness of the touch sensitive buttons on the left hand side that only appear when you need them, for play, stop and skip track again touch sensitive buttons.  I like this level of control.   The 40 CD can be extra stealthy with a very cool feature called auto hide, that will dim the screen but also illuminate it again when close motion is detected, this is a very nice feature.  You can still of course dim or illuminate the display from the remote control

I do wish the text on the screen was a larger as there seems to be a lot of screen not being used so larger text seems possible and would be easier to read at a distance.

New sound too?

Lets talk about sound quality using the 40 CD as a CD player so using its internal DAC feeding analogue into the Cyrus 40 Amp powering the SVS Titan speakers. Straight away CD sounds different to Tidal streaming that I am very used to, it’s a little more old fashioned sounding to me. I don’t say that in a bad way, it just felt different to listen to and it took me a little getting used to.

The 40 CD needed to run in and settle down, I noticed the sound smoothed out some but most importantly relaxed some after some playing hours and it’s the relaxed aspect to the music delivery I am referring to with my “old fashioned” sound comment. I have found modern streaming DAC’s, especially at the very affordable end of the market can sound a bit tense and that can make them sound harder and sometimes thinner too, so not relaxed or relaxing.  I maybe have a memory of Cyrus CD players sounding a little like that back in the day when I owned one but there is none of that here with this new 40 CD. Cyrus have definitely gone for a smooth sound here, but not soft, just smooth, where music is not hard or edgy at all unless the CD is particularly like that of course.

I listened through a whole variety of CD albums from MJ to Metallica and the Cyrus 40 CD and AMP pairing sounded very impressive in some key areas. Firstly is the middle region of the sound so the vocals and upper or mid bass and the lower treble region is all excellent. The timing is good, there a nice fullness and richness to the vocals, the bass is tight, punchy and full too and there is an excellent amount of detail happening in the music, but with an overriding smoothness to it all. For me this is a nice way to do it.  The 40 CD’s sound is not the last word in clarity or detail or specificity instead it gives you a healthy dose of it, but it just seems to ease off the edges and relax and that is what took me a little getting used to. I am used to a more direct or cutting sound, but I started to appreciate the 40 CD’s presentation as being relaxing but without losing the musics energy, so your feet keep on tapping if the music is good.

There are some pros and cons for the rest though. The sound stage delivery has very good depth when the music allows, the see through the speakers onto the music is very good. To test this I used an audiophile CD called Fascination with sound from German speaker manufacturer Nubert. Its a great disc for testing sound stage.  The final two tracks in particular are very atmospheric with a lot of reverberant details in the recording.  The expansiveness of these tracks played through the 40 CD  was very good but comparing to the best I have heard in my room the Cyrus felt a little reserved too, like there was a set sized overall music frame that everything was happening within, rather than being fully freely expansive in the room. However within its set sized sound frame everything with the music was layered and organised and timed exceptionally well, tonally full and relaxed sounding, so there is a big pro here but a con that comes along with it.

The treble is detailed and nice and smooth with a pleasant ring to it in the main, excuse the pun, but similar to the sound stage I found it to be a little play it safe. I generally don’t mind that presentation but it made me think about the old stereotype of Cyrus gear sounding bright, if that was true gone are those days.  However I did notice at times some lack of composure or maybe just a little grit to the sound in the upper vocals, not terribly so, just a little bit.  It was far from all the time either and just in some music but I heard it a number of times so its right to mention it.

CD Player or CD Transport?

I have to say the in the main, few not picks aside the Cyrus 40 CD and 40 AMP pairing delivered a very full and pleasing bass with a good amount of drive, very good timing, and music depending it could be very lively and punchy, or very nuanced and detailed. I liked that the bass was always nice and full bass so always pleasing.  When I was really pushing the volume loud as I do for big bass music like Rudimental’s Home album, the bass again in the main was very good, big room filling and full with a nice smooth flow to it. The SVS Titan are like speakers and subwoofers in one and they are demanding of an amplifier to control their very big bass output. I could hear the deepest bass notes composure was being lost just a little bit, far from terrible, just a little bit so this was the perfect time to do a comparison to see if it was the amplifier or the CD player’s DAC.

I started listening to the 40 CD just as a transport feeding music digitally into my reference DAC the Chord Hugo TT2 that I know delivers very tight bass always. This was interesting as the music presentation totally changed.  Yes of course Taylor Swift still sounded like her, but now her music was taller or grander in terms of the overall scale and more 3D out into the room, more expansive. It also sounded faster and more on the front foot for the music’c energy with a more pronounced focus on the small details in the music layers and the leading edges of the music sharpened up a lot, all things we know Chord DAC’s do exceptionally well. But the fullness of the sound, especially the upper mid bass felt noticeably leaner and not as satisfying to me in the same way.  So while some of the bass composure was better I am not sure it was better as an overall whole.

Depending on the music I preferred one DAC more than the other. The external Chord opened up the musical window much wider that’s for sure and sounded cleaner overall. Back to what I said about the CD 40 using its internal DAC there was that same perceived set sized sound stage frame limiting how expansive music could sound, however again, within that frame the music is presented fantastically well.  Good enough to be hanging with the more expensive Chord DAC in its own way and I think its sound balanced better with the Cyrus 40 Amp for overall musical enjoyment.  This comparison showed to me that despite how good the Cyrus built in DAC sounds there is more there to be had from each CD and that is where the potential of adding the 40 PSU upgrade becomes very interesting. Not to ruin my review of the 40 PSU, as a quick bite it makes a huge improvement to the 40CD and removes any shackles of its sound and more.

Different amplifier different result?

What about the 40 CD with a totally different amplifier, could I learn anything else about it.  I tested it as a CD player with the Gryphon Diablo 300 because I think the all black industrial look of both matches up great and the Diablo 300 has been one of the best integrated amplifiers for around decade, so a real test for the 40 CD’s sound quality.  No surprise to me really it sounded fantastic with the Gryphon amp and this combination got more out of the SVS speakers.

The 40 CD still had its slightly old fashioned calm, relax and surefooted sound with the very nice smoothness and and fullness of tone that I had come to really like about it by now. I got everything the same as with the Cyrus 40 Amp for the good and less good but the Gryphon adding something pretty special to the party in terms of its muscular sound but we don’t need to get in that here. This test showed to me that the 40 CD is a very good CD player in its own right, even if not quite perfect it can stand on its own as part of a  high end, non all Cyrus HiFi system, like any very good CD player can and it can still shine.

Final Thoughts

Summing up, I have very much enjoyed my little trip down CD playing memory lane, listening to albums I have not in a long time. Some I had forgotten about and how good they as CD’s can sound. But I don’t think I have forgotten anything, I don’t think CD players sounded this good for me in my past and we have to consider how DAC technology has massively advanced and improved in the last 10 years even if the CD playing process has stayed the same.

My testing of the 40 CD proved to me it can stand on its own acting as a high end digital CD playing source as part of a very good high quality system and its sound will be quite flexible and not fussy of the other equipment you use it with.  I think its overall sound is very balanced across the full spectrum and and not too far down any one sound rabbit hole to make it quirky or hard work. Some might think this is to be expected for a CD player with a retail price of £2995, but there is never that guarantee in HiFi as we all know.

I do think pairing it with other Cyrus 40 products such as the 40 amp and the 40 PSU is likely to be what a lot of people will do and then you do get a great natural sound synergy as you would hope to from using all one manufacturer’s equipment. I can say quite clearly that listening to the 40 CD shows this is far from Cyrus first rodeo with CD players, I think it shows decades of experience and why Cyrus still make CD players in 2024, because they sound really great.

A Special Performer Award is Pursuit Perfect Systems highest accolade and is in recognition of exceptional product performance regardless of price

For the full specification of the 40 CD CD player see their website linked here