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Engadget UK giveaway: Win a Cyrus One amplifier and streaming starter kit
If you're in the midst of planning a little soirée over the Christmas period, or are generally just a bit of an audiophile, then we're giving away the perfect piece of kit this week. The sleek, minimalist Cyrus One amplifier features four line level inputs and two, 100W outputs to power your speaker setup at home. And if the amp's aptX-compatible Bluetooth connection isn't wireless enough for you, our friends at Cyrus Audio are throwing in a Chromecast Audio and three-month subscription to Tidal's lossless 'HiFi' streaming tier to boot -- a bundle that's currently available at various specialist retailers for a limited time. Get involved in the giveaway by turning your attention to the Rafflecopter widget below, and all we ask is you give the rules a quick glance before you do.
Cyrus Lyric plays high-grade audio from seemingly any source
Cyrus' new Lyric series music players may look like inkjet printers, but don't judge them on their looks -- they may be ideal hubs for audiophile-grade living room audio. Both the Lyric 05 (80W per channel, 24-bit DAC) and Lyric 09 (170W per channel, 32-bit DAC) can stream 24-bit, 192kHz tunes from other devices on a local network, with an iPad app serving as the remote control. That's just the start of their audio abilities, though. They'll also stream internet radio, and they play most music from Bluetooth- or USB-based sources; more conventional listeners still have access to a CD player, DAB+ radio, FM radio and a mixture of both analog and digital inputs. Prices are high at £2,250 ($3,673) for a Lyric 05 and £3,000 ($4,897) for a Lyric 09, but the premium may be worthwhile for music aficionados unwilling to compromise on either convenience or sound quality.
Seen@E3: Will 'Cyrus' Powers, happy to be a Tester
Remember Will "Cyrus" Powers, winner of the PSN reality series, The Tester? He appeared at the E3 PlayStation.Blog meetup (in addition to surprise guest Hideo Kojima) and we talked about how life is as a video game tester. With realistic expectations of a not-so-glamorous job, Powers felt welcomed by SCEA and even teased about some initiation rituals. Powers did make it clear that he doesn't intend to stop at being a tester, looking to rise the corporate ladder. With the support of a surprising number of fans (check Twitter!), he might just be able to do it.
Interview: Will 'Cyrus' Powers, winner of The Tester
Here's something you haven't seen on The Tester, Sony's PSN-exclusive reality series: winning contestant Will Powers (aka Cyrus) receiving a novelty $5,000 check. We had a chance to chat with the next PlayStation game tester, who talked about his aspirations and why he decided to pursue such a difficult challenge for an entry-level job in the games industry. Joystiq: What was life like at The Tester behind the scenes, when the cameras weren't rolling? Will Powers: When we were awake, they were always rolling. It's just a matter of what made it into the final cut or not. Essentially, the dynamic of the house, everyone was really competitive. They set us up with a couple of PlayStation 3 systems and multiplayer games, and an air hockey table. It didn't matter what we were doing. We were always competing at something, which was kind of ironic. When we had down time from actual challenges within the competition, we were still competing.
The CyrusLink LinkMini Two iPod speaker system
UK-based CyrusLink has released a few iPod speaker systems, but we hadn't heard anything about the outfit's latest effort, the LinkMini Two, until the crew at ShinyShiny spotted its nondescript Amazon page. Featuring a 10-watt sub and two five-watt satellites with aluminum cones, the Two probably won't win any design awards any time soon, but Cyrus is known for solid audio and the £61 ($126) pricetag seems fairly reasonable. Available now to our British friends, but there's no word if we'll see this bad boy in the States.[Via Shiny Shiny]
