Cayin's History

CAYIN Audio Distribution GmbH is situated in a small suburb of Kelkheim, up in the Taunus hills, not far away from Frankfurt. After being importers and distributors for high end audio equipment for 20 years we had been continuously dissatisfied with the price/quality relation of audio components made in the western world.

In 1996 we discovered the immense potential of Chinese tube amp manufacturers. Their solid, excellent build quality and their ability to execute delicate point to point wiring instead of using sound degrading circuit boards were so convincing that we decided to elaborate a line of products made in China for the European market. We engaged a manufacturer to build the equipment according to our instruction and component specification.

We first introduced a line of tube amplifiers under our brand name CAYIN. These products have been accepted enthusiastically by the audio press and the audiophile customer. For many years the CAYIN 500 integrated has been the best selling tube amp in West Europe in its class, this amplifier and its successor, the 500MK have received reference classification reviews in European audio magazines for more than 12 years.

Many of the new Cayin products have been raised to reference status by notable reviewers and are very much respected in the community of audiophiles. For about ten years now our engineers have designed more specialised products under the brand name “Lyric”. These products have now become the quality standard in their price brackets. Some of our products are completed in our factory.

The selected tubes are installed after a burn in of at least 50 hrs. Other parts, such as the sensible D/A conversion sections and phono equalisation circuits are carefully inserted in the basic product by our engineers. Every item receives a final inspection test to guarantee highest quality.