Impressive Jeff Rowland Corus Pre-amplifier

Big E reported extensively on this Jeff Rowland Pre-amp a few days ago, see his post here. I concur with his findings, the Corus indeed is one of the best pre-amps out there.

The construction quality will be the first factor to captivate anyone who crosses the path of a Corus. True to the Jeff Rowland tradition, the main unit is impeccably built, the jewel-like front fascia has the signature Jeff Rowland wavy reflective pattern, and the main body is carved from a solid billet of aluminium (the review unit from CMY is protected with a transparent plastic film as shown in the photo):


In its bid to keep any interference from the music signal inside the main chassis, Jeff Rowland builds the remote receiver and the power supply as outboard units:

Outboard remote receiver

Outboard power supply. On the other end of this box is a power switch and an IEC inlet

From the power supply on to the pre-amp inputs and outputs, you can see that the Corus is dual mono in construction:

The remote control is chunky and heavy as it is also carved from a solid billet of aluminium. The only complaint I have is that the buttons and the labels are too small. After a while though you would be able to get to the right button by touch, even in the dark, by ‘feeling’ for its position:

The Jeff Rowland Corus' manual lays down the design philosophy and features, click on each photo for a bigger version:

The sound of the Jeff Rowland pre-amp kind of took me by surprise. I don’t know where I got the impression, but I thought of Jeff Rowland as sounding delicate, refined and probably quite civilised. However the Corus came out to be robust, fast and powerful, yet at the same time, it also sounded smooth and refined (so I am still right on one count). This is a pre-amp that would let its hair down to party and it can rock when the occasion calls for. And while doing all this it would still maintain its poise, it absolutely would not offend.


The Jeff Rowland Corus is indeed impressive and in my opinion is one of today's pre-amp top dogs no doubt. The Corus lists for RM54,450.

JRDG is available at CMY Audio & Visual, contact John at 03-21439206.