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The vanquishing    
Sometimes you just gotta leave well enough alone and be patient. Clock your 150 hours, then disconnect all components, don’t play music for a day or two, then see what treasures time the revelator brought worth waiting for. From that New Day onward, the V3 amplifiers have been quite the - um, upgrade. What first struck me as a remarkable difference were the bass registers. The upgraded V3 amplifiers have a more overt bass than the V2. Transient attack in the bass is much more pronounced, more detailed and nuanced, with the leading edges of notes hitting harder and suffering nothing by the way of overhang. It’s deeper bass too.



Mino Cinelu’s self-titled CD is a bit of a reference in terms of bass that’s both deep and socks you in the gut. The V3s made the WATT/Puppy plunge deeper into subwoofer territory while maintaining window-rattling power. If you want an eerie experience, play the first track "Chouval Boa" whose wind-like effect almost wraps around you from the speakers’ sides. The V2 did this too but the V3 seemed to extend farther out. While talking soundstage, the V3 is a clear improvement in stage depth. Play the appropriate recording and you’ll be rewarded with a stage that seemingly extends well past the back wall. Many tracks from Sera Una Noche (seasoned audiophiles will know this CD intimately) presented musical cues that created an illusion of cavernous depth.


Verity with veracity
Want to really hear how good your tweeters can be? The V3 will show you in a subtler and softer way than the V2s— good as they were—ever managed. The V3 highs are more delicate if a tad more laid back which integrates them with the rest of the range in a far more cohesive way. The new boards make the Ref 9 SEs more refined sophisticates. Micro detail in particular has improved to the point where there’s the impression of plainly more information. It’s the stuff that resolute systems love to show off - nail on string, foot on pedal, brush on snare and air in throat. Having said that, this added musical detail is not presented in an etched and clinical manner. It’s a natural-sounding gift to be savored like a spice that enhances a dish.


Once again transient attack and dynamic power come to light especially in the midrange. Just play a well recorded vocal backed by guitar like most the tracks on Angus and Julia Stone’s A Book Like This. You’ll be impressed with the attack, pristine clarity and harmonic content of the guitar that underpins the very present vocal harmonies without overpowering. The kick drum on "Here We Go Again" has a thud that goes straight to the pit of your stomach.   


Perhaps the most striking difference between V2 and V3 is the utter transparency the upgrade, pun intended, brought on board. True, your gear better be up to scratch as the V3s will reveal upstream weaknesses. But they’ll also extract the soul of the music. The veil lifting analogy has been overdone to the point of becoming a dead cliché, hence it’s best to describe the V3’s resolution capabilities as possessing an overall nuance-retrieving cleanliness and tidiness that passes on more unadulterated information to the speakers. More information means more detail—more of that micro dynamic quality referred to earlier—and, all things being equal equipment wise, a truth of timbre that correlates far more with reality.
  Sidebar – NuForce full cable range overview
To coincide with the V3 upgrade review, NuForce sent along a full complement of their new cable collection. The cables cover the whole gamut of options from RCA and XLR interconnects (IC-700) to spade and banana-terminated speaker cables (SC-700) on to Toslink optical and BNC coaxial digital links (OT-700 and DC-800 respectively). What’s more, they also offer a very high-specification HDMI 1.3 cable (HD-900). All the cables sport parameters and design elements that optimize them within systems that include components with switch-mode power supplies. Of course they should perform just as well with linear power supply componentry.


The IC-700 interconnects and speaker cables share a topology NuForce calls "Focused Field Technology". The interconnect features two OFHC copper conductors with hollow cores which according to NuForce is best for skin surface conductivity and also allows conductor proximity. The cables are shielded twice with a copper braid and foil respectively which can be seen wrapped around the length of the cable through the clear outer jacket. Material value for the RCAs seems high at a 1m/pr price of $199.


The SC-700 speaker cable uses an unusual multi array of OFHC copper strands which combine twin round and twin rectangular bundles. Again there’s heavy shielding but the cable remains quite flexible. One criticism of the speaker cables concerns the arrangement around the terminations. The dressing where the positive and negative runs split is wrapped in a soft rubbery jacket. It looks cheap in contrast to the rest of the very classy-looking assembly and I also found the splits too short and difficult to handle in tight or hard-to-manage situations especially where connecting force had to be applied. Apart from that small issue, build and connector quality of these cables is very good indeed. They’re available in single and bi-wire configurations. The SC-700 starts at a very reasonable $450 for a 2.5m set.


Commendably – more cable manufacturers should do this – NuForce publishes cable impedance, capacitance and resistance (LCR) specifications. For a 2-meter length, the IC-700 interconnect’s LCR figures are as follows: 1.3 uH, 300 mOhm and 250 pF. For a 2.5m length of SC-700 speaker cable, NuForce specifies 445 nH, 28 mOhm and 1100 pF.


I set out to test the full audio cable loom within my system and the NuForce cable loom displayed some of its claimed characteristics. These are certainly fast-sounding cables with solid bass and smooth tonality. Swapping between them and my much more expensive Cable Research Labs reference cables showed the CRLs to have a denser sense of midrange body and a tad fuller but slower bass. The NuForce cables are actually quite refined when you take into account their asking price. The intelligently designed conductor and shielding arrangement deliver a synergistic sound provided your components work in balance to begin with.


NuForce is particularly proud of their new HDMI cable. This very highly-spec’d cable boasts a  high 20GB/s transmission rate which according to NuForce makes it one of the fastest HDMI cables on the market. The delicate HDMI connection seems of very high quality too. This cable delivered some very sharp, color-faithful and artifact-free images from my Panasonic BD-80 Blu-ray player into a Philips 1080p/24 LCD display.


NuForce now offers a complete set of well-made cables that sound good together or individually and contain innovative designs – no off-the-spool repackaged generics –very reasonably priced. Well done!   

The mirage is more authentic and in the literal meaning of the word, mimics reality in a way that can sometimes almost fool you. That’s the V3.


Victory                  
NuForce is an ever-expanding outfit that now offers a complete system solution from source to speakers and the cables in-between. As the saying goes, the company doesn’t sit on its laurels. It displays a commitment to enhance its products with timely, cost-effective yet worthwhile improvements that assure it a thankful and loyal client base.


It’s not rocket science really. It’s just a sound business model from a company that provides good old-fashioned service and respects the customers who provide for its very existence. And the latest V3 upgrade to the highly respected Reference 9 Special Edition genuinely puts the product at a level that you can be confident will compete with exalted company. Yes, these amps tend to be system fussy. Like any high-quality and revealing component, they need to be careful matched with the rest of the system. Cables, isolation and preceding componentry will make or break them. But work at it and the results will be rewarding.  


I’ll say it again - get over technology prejudices of class A, class AB, SET and so forth. Get things right and the V3 Reference 9 Special Edition amplifiers will compete with any amplifier you care to mention at any price while running cool and draining very little electricity from your wall socket. Go on, do your bit to save the planet. Your conscience and ears will thank you.


Quality of packing:
V3 board packed in a bubble-wrap envelope; cables well packed in plastic and cardboard boxes   
Reusability of packing: Cable pizza boxes are reusable
Ease of assembly: Board installation requires some soldering. An experienced technician installed the new boards in less than 20 minutes
Website comments: Comprehensive announcements of the new upgrade and ample information on the cable range.
Warranty: 12 months.                                 
Human or web interactions: Always prompt and forthcoming with information.
Final comments & suggestions: The speaker cable’s sheathing near the connectors was somewhat restrictive.

Nuforce website
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