Pictures from Nordost Nation! November 2018

Nordost is lucky to have such incredibly loyal and enthusiastic customers! One great way that our fans let us know that they are happy with the work that we do is by sending us pictures of their Nordost products in action. Here are a few photos that have been shared with us recently. Feel free to send us pictures of Nordost in your system, via Facebook, info@nordost.com, or #nordostcables on Instagram, so that we can continue to share them with the whole Nordost family!


@finna_no shared this great shot of his system with Heimdall 2

Westcoast Audio Video Gallery took this incredible shot of our Blue Heaven Speaker Cables with Norse Bi-Wire Jumpers

@krisztian7305 took this picture of his guitars and Nordost cables. Great sound all around!

@audiophiledk showing off some Odin 2 Cables being supported by our Sort Lifts

@henrikstylisaudio says “Nothing better than a small headphone set up in the office.”

@soundquest_ about to impress some lucky listeners with a demo of Odin 2

@ronnyhaga is “Wired for the weekend :)”

Westcoast Audio Video Gallery with another great shot— this time of our Sort Kone resonance control devices

VPI wired their reference system with Odin 2 for the perfect launch of the HW-40.

@cultoffonza took this pic of his rack, wired with Heimdall 2 and featuring a QX Power Purifier!

@stylusaudio shared this picture of a YG speaker wired with a Valhalla 2 Speaker Cable and Reference Jumpers

@huge_sound shared this image of an impressive system featuring Magico, Bryston, CH Precision, Constellation, Tenor, and, of course, Nordost.

@thetruewei took this shot of his Focal Utopias with the Heimdall 2 Headphone Cable

@sientelibre has his system connected with Nordost!

@dreamavperth took this shot of our Heimdall 2 Speaker Cable on display at the Hong Kong AV Show

Absolute Audio Video (@absoluteaudioyyc) shared this shot of one of their clients’ incredible music collection. “Not a bad system also” 🤩

 

NOVO continues their 3 part review series with the Blue Heaven USB and Speaker Cable

The third installment of NOVO magazine’s three-part cable upgrade series, The Journey to Higher Quality Audio With Nordost Leif Cables: Part 3 or 3 was released this October. Reviewer Suave Kajko is taking his readers through the process of maximizing the performance of their audio systems step by step. While parts 1 and 2 focused on Blue Heaven Interconnects and Power Cords, part 3 sees Suave shift his focus to Blue Heaven USB and Speaker Cables. With a full loom of Blue Heaven cables finally installed in his system, Suave finds a refinement to every discernible improvement he made along the away. However, what may surprise most readers is the difference that the USB cable made, since many up-and-coming audio enthusiast dismiss such digital cable upgrades.

 

“With the Blue Heaven USB cable in place, between my laptop and the DAC, I was rewarded with a further lowered noise floor, which resulted in a wider soundstage, with more precise positioning… both instruments and vocals sounded closer to what you expect to hear in real life, deepening the music listening experience.” – Suave Kajko

 

You can now read all three parts of Suave’s Blue Heaven cable review in the review section of the Nordost website –

The Journey to Higher Quality Audio With Nordost Leif Cables: Part 1 of 3

The Journey to Higher Quality Audio With Nordost Leif Cables: Part 2 of 3

The Journey to Higher Quality Audio With Nordost Leif Cables: Part 3 of 3

Purple Flare— The perfect upgrade for the Bluesound NODE 2i

By James Davies of Absolute Audio

Any review of a product in context of the Bluesound NODE 2i will read like a love letter to the NODE itself! The NODE 2i is brilliantly engineered and executed; designed with audiophile sensibilities but with the features and form factor to appeal to a much larger consumer base, the NODE 2i perfectly bridges the gap between high performance audio and mass appeal.

For my review, I decided to use the NODE 2i “full monty”: I hooked the unit directly up to my power amplifier, using the NODE 2i’s streaming services through its built in DAC chips and digital volume control. I did not want to spoil or flavor the performance, nor did I want to introduce too many variables, which only prove to confuse things. In fact, using the NODE 2i in this manner gave me the chance to directly compare an otherwise bargain priced, single box, source/preamp (the two most critical items within a HiFi system) to my much higher priced, separate components. All cabling within the system was a combination of Purple Flare Interconnects and Speaker Cables, and Blue Heaven Power Cords. All components were connected to a QB8 power distribution bar, used in conjunction with a QKORE1.

The immediate impression the NODE 2i makes on the listener is of a very large scale sound for such an affordable piece. The sound-stage is both wide and tall, though with a relatively shallow sense of physical depth. This is not to say that the NODE 2i is flat sounding — just that its presentation is more on the forward and energetic side of things. At no time did the NODE 2i sound brash or unrefined. Tones and timbres, if not perfectly neutral, certainly never sounded anything other than correct. This is an area where affordable digital HiFi often shows its cards: the sound must be voiced to be appealing, but often ends up sounding grossly colored in some fashion. This is not the case with the NODE 2i — its sonics are otherwise unobtrusive.

After listening to the NODE 2i for several days I then swapped out its factory supplied two prong power cord for the Nordost Purple Flare Power Cord. I have to admit I am somewhat biased in favor of the Purple Flare, as I have firsthand experience with it, used on my AppleTV and Samsung TV. In both cases, the visual image was far more vibrant than when used with the factory power cords. I certainly expected the Purple Flare to bring improvements to the NODE 2i, but I wasn’t entirely sure in what ways.

With Purple Flare plugged in, the NODE 2i retained its overall appealing character. The sound was still energetic— fast and powerful. My “consumer” ears heard a further improvement of the NODE 2i’s overall sound. What was immediately apparent to my “audiophile” ears was that the higher and lower frequencies now had greater delineation. While this type of improvement is hard to quantify, it is important to stress that music in real life has a “continual” sound, where frequencies extend as far as the environment allows, rather than the more abrasive frequency roll off that electronics inevitably perform. While this more continuous presentation now allowed me to listen longer at higher volumes with less fatigue, it also represented a more natural overall sound at all volumes. Large scale and complex music had less confusion with the Purple Flare Power Cord in place.

The NODE 2i has a very present upper midrange, which is why I think it sounds so appealing and energetic. If a product were to couple this with less well represented higher frequency band, the presentation could become uneven and brash. While I alluded before that I would not characterize the NODE 2i as brash sounding per se, with the Purple Flare installed, the sound was certainly even smoother.

The NODE 2i’s bass frequencies are the only area where I could ever be truly critical—certainly not of the performance at the price—rather in terms of absolute resolution. The bass is somewhat compressed, giving the NODE 2i a great sense of punch, but without the dry control and heft of much more expensive digital components. With the Purple Flare in place, bass frequencies too are improved, gaining a degree of that dryness, which better represents natural bass instruments, without loosing the NODE 2i’s characteristic punch.

Things got really interesting after leaving the Purple Flare Power Cord in place for over 24 hours. When I returned to my system to listen further, I was presented with a more “liquid” presentation I’d not yet attributed to the NODE 2i. Frequencies across the range had more weight to them (in the sense that frequencies would sound closer to this in real life). However, where I was now most impressed was with a new found sense of physical depth to recordings through the NODE 2i via the Purple Flare. While still retaining the initial impressions of width and height, the sound of the NODE 2i was now more complete in all plains.

Depth of stereo image is something I normally exclusively attribute to higher end electronics. It is arguable that no one other than the recording engineer has any concrete knowledge of how much depth any one recording should have. The same goes for image specificity, width, height, and overall scale. I did not engineer any of these recordings and I am certainly not an authority on how they should sound 😉 but I’ll take any little improvement that further provides the illusion of a live performance.

What is so impressive about the NODE 2i combined with the Purple Flare Power Cord is how close their combined performance was to much, much more expensive equipment. The NODE 2i is a clearly well engineered component whose full potential can be easily realized with the affordable Purple Flare Power Cord.

Upcoming Dealer Events and Trade Shows (Fall 2018)

Nordost has a busy Fall ahead of us!  We hope to see you at some of these great events.


AUDIO VIDEO THERAPY NORDOST EVENT

Come and join us for a night of demonstrations, comparisons and great music! Audio Video Therapy, in Nashua, NH, is hosting an event Friday, November 9th, from 5:30-9 PM. All are welcome to enjoy the music, food, and refreshments! We hope to see you there, for this fantastic opportunity to hear top rate products perform at their best.

November 9th

5:30pm – 9:00pm

Audio Video Therapy

216 Daniel Webster Hwy

Nashua, NH

(603) 888-9777

john@audiovideotherapy.net

www.avtherapy.net


NORDOST AT THE HI-FI SHOW – LIVE

Nordost is excited to be a part of the Hi-Fi Show – Live, held by Hi-Fi News at the De Vere Beaumont Estate in Windsor, UK on November 10-11th. Visit us in the Morley Suite, where Nordost will be exhibiting alongside Esoteric, in a system using Kef Reference 5 speakers. Throughout the show, Nordost will be demonstrating the effects of our V2 cables, QKORE grounding system, Sort Kones, and ethernet cables. We look forward to seeing you there!

Hi-Fi Show – Live

November 10-11

De Vere Beaumont Estate

The Morley Suite

www.hifinews.co.uk


AUDIO VISION SF — BIG FREE EVENT!

If you are a hifi-lover in the San Francisco area, make sure to clear your calendar on Thursday, November 15th from 7:30-10 PM for a “BIG FREE EVENT!”. Audio Visions SF is hosting a free and fun evening filled with wine, beer, cheese, and hifi. Don’t miss this chance to win some wonderful prizes. This event will be featuring Chord digital and analogue electronics, SME turntables, Raidho loudspeakers, and, of course, Nordost cables and power/grounding systems. To attend this amazing event, please rsvp to info@audiovisionsf.com.

November 15th

“BIG FREE EVENT!”

7:30pm – 10:00pm

Audio Vision SF

1628 California St.

Sn Francisco, CA

RSVP info@audiovisionsf.com

www.audiovisionsf.com


NORDOST AT THE WARSAW AUDIO VIDEO SHOW

Join Nordost at the Audio Video Show, November 16-18th at the Polish National Football Stadium in Warsaw. This will be Nordost’s first event with our new partners in Poland, Audio Center, and we couldn’t be more excited to put on a fantastic show together! Come and see us in room 214 to see a first-rate system, featuring Moon, Audio Vector, and, of course, Nordost cables. Throughout the show we will be showcasing our Heimdall 2 cables, and demonstrating our QKORE grounding system, Sort Kones, power cords, and ethernet cables.

Warsaw Audio Video Show

November 16-18

Polish National Football Stadium

Room 214

www.audioshow.pl


JS AUDIO NORDOST EVENT

JS Audio is putting on another fabulous event at their showroom in Bethesda, MD. Come and join us on Saturday, December 1st to enjoy a world-class system, featuring Wilson Audio, dCS, and Nordost. You don’t want to miss out on this opportunity to learn what our transformative products have to offer your home audio system. A Nordost representative and product specialist will be on hand, performing demonstrations and answering questions.

December 1st

JS Audio

4919 St. Elmo Avenue

Bethesda, MD

(301) 656-7020

js@jsaudio.com

www.jsaudio.com


NORDOST AT CES

Nordost is happy to be attending CES in Las Vegas January 8-11th. Nordost is teaming up with VTL this year on floor 20, room 201 at the Venetian, to put on a show-stopping system. Take advantage of this great opportunity to hear, firsthand, what our transformative products have to offer your home audio system. We hope to see you there!

CES

January 8-11

The Venetian

Room 29-210

www.ces.tech


 

Nordost Playlist – November 2018

Nordost is lucky to have a wonderful team of representatives and product trainers who travel around the world educating and demonstrating the effects of Nordost’s products. As part of these demonstrations, it is our job to find an interesting and diverse selection of music to showcase our cables, power devices, sort system and accessories. Whether at shows, visiting our dealers and distributors or even in our own listening room in our headquarters in Holliston, we are constantly getting asked what music we are playing (or if our audience is not so bold to ask, we can see their Shazams working overtime). So we thought this would be a perfect opportunity to share our favorite songs of the moment. Some may be classics, some may be brand new, some may not even be to your taste, but one thing is for sure …it’s all great music.

Here are some of the songs that we will have on rotation this November.


You can now listen to our monthly playlist here:  TIDAL  |  SPOTIFY


  1. Rang Tang Ring Toon—Mountain Man—Magic Ship
  2. Try a Little Tenderness—Dee Dee Bridgewater—Memphis…Yes, I’m Ready
  3. Right Now—Dirty Projectors—Lamp Lit Prose
  4. A Pirate Looks At Forty—Jack Johnson, Dave Matthews, Tim Reynolds—Jack Johnson & Friends: Best of Kokua Festival, A Benefit For The Kokua Hawaii Foundation
  5. Trampled Underfoot—Vanessa Fernandez—When the Levee Breaks
  6. Yip Roc Heresy—Slim Gaillard And His Orchestra—Laughing In Rhythm: The Best Of The Verve Years
  7.  Love Is For Me—The Meters—Rejuvenation
  8. Alien (Hold On to Your Dreams)—Gil Scott-Heron—Nothing New
  9. Over Everything—Courtney Barnett and Kurt Vile—Lotta Sea Lice
  10. Freelance—Toro y Moi—Freelance

 

Nordost is headed to the New York Audio Show

Nordost is thrilled to be exhibiting at the New York Audio Show with our friends and partners, Magico and AVM. The New York Audio Show will be held at the Park Lane Hotel, November 9th – 11th. Be sure to visit us in suite 701 to hear a world class sound system featuring Nordost’s extensive range of products. We hope that everyone in the area will be able to visit us to hear, firsthand, what our transformative products have to offer your home audio system.

New York Audio Show
November 9th–11th
Park Lane Hotel
New York, NY
www.chestergroup.org/newyorkaudioshow/2018