CAYIN C9

CAYIN C9

Reference Portable Headphone Amplifier

CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
CAYIN C9
2.298,00 Price include 21% VAT Price exclude VAT € 1.899,17
AVAILABILITY1 WEEK

he Cayin C9 is a transportable dual Korg NuTube balanced portable amplifier featuring dual operational mode and timbral controls.

The Cayin C9 is a fully discreet pure portable amplifier with both balanced and unbalanced inputs and outputs. It has no DAC inside and can run off a set of batteries, (more about that further down). The argument being is that DAC technology can get dated rather quickly and thus shortening the product lifecycle. I agree with this point. A lot of my best amplifiers are years old but outside of my 1990’s Meridian 506, the bulk of my delta-sigma DAC/Amps in use are quite new. The C9 amplification has two core timbres with an ability to run both as a solid-state and dual-tube amplifier as well as dual amplifier operational mode (DAO) allowing you to switch between a Class A and Class AB output. Because each Class is independent of the timbral modes you can operate with either timbre in your mode of choice giving you a potential of 4 standard mode sound signatures. The dual timbre and DAO mode are, in a way, legacy concepts from the N8 DAP which was the first to introduce switchable timber and operational modes. It is something Cayin has also introduced at the mid-fi end with their N3Pro, albeit with a different tube topology.

We say the legacy of the N8 because at the heart of the C9 we have the same Korg NuTube 6P1 that Cayin first used inside their flagship DAP. Korg Nutube technology works on the same basis as traditional tubes, offering the same vaunted “tube” sound but it is designed in a totally different way. Critically, this is a design that will quite happily work inside portable devices because of its unique spring-loaded suspension system designed by Cayin to eliminate microphonics or ‘tube ping’. You can see from the stock photo above how the Nutube NP61 inside a portable audio device can become a physical possibility. This small flat piece of engineering actually has an anode filament structure and operates exactly as a triode vacuum tube would. Also, the power consumption of the Nutube is approximately 2% of that of a regular tube making it a battery-friendly design.