Nordost Valhalla: Hype or Heaven?

Just wondered if we've got any rich buggers in here who might want to present a case for this über cable and it's frankly astonishingly high price.

I've only ever heard it once - at a show - and it just sounded bright to me, but then we all know that shows are no place to expect a good sound!

John

PS. No, my enquiry does not imply that I'm considering Valhalla - just curious. I can't justify that kinda dough on a wire...

 

I think you either like the Nordost sound or not. I have auditioned lower end speaker wire (Red Dawn) and found it initially impressive with loads of etched detail. Subsequently I felt that it robbed the sound of that tactility, and depth of sound, and made everything sound a bit two dimensional, although with layers of two-dimensionality, if that makes any sense.
I also tried the Thor power conditioner. Somewhat similar rsults but fundamentally underwhelming.
I finally tried the silver shadow digital interconnect for DVD use. This was a keeper for me with the extra detail being worthwhile. Of course I do not use my DVD player for listening to music

 

I use a Valhalla cable in my demo box, purelly to show people what ther are NOT missing.
Etched is a good word to discribe Valhalla, if your system supports it, it can work well.
There are much better products out there and for a lot less IMO. Wm

 

it didn't offer any significant improvement over the Blue Heaven I was using at the time and less so over my current Townshend Isolda cable.

 

Interesting. I have heard from Solar Wind up to SPM in my system, and I did feel the sound improved going up the range. However, with the exception of SPM, they weren't hugely expensive wires, yet as the price increased, the difference between the cable and the one below became significantly smaller (if you get my meaning). Which makes me wonder if Valhalla is all hype. I'd love to hear a Valhalla fan defend its ridiculous price...

 

Interesting comments re Nordost products. I'm about to change to Blue Heaven, as I could hear a significant improvement over my previous cables. With the recent price reductions, this has become a much more sensibly priced product. I still use the old 10% of your system cost rule, and this cable falls below that.

On the Valhalla front, perhaps buyers of extereme hi-fi also use the 10% rule. If you have a system that approached £100K (a surprising number out there), then in that context perhaps Valahall seems good value. It beggars belief that all the people who buy it are doing so purely because it's expensive. Presumably they believe it to be worth the investment. Most of those buying super systems have had to work for their money; I can't see them all becoming stupidly wasteful overnight!

Right now Valhalla seems silly to me. But, I also remember thinking that spending over £2K on a CD player seemed silly. And the silly thing is really producing some really nice music.

 

True, so true. My mate Simon is into cables and tweaks and the like. He's loaned me some PS Audio powerchords (US fitting, natch) to try, along with some nice looking interconnects and a set of ball bearing feet style things.

What's interesting is that I don't know how much any of this retails for, though I expect the powerchords are quite pricy as they're very heavy, well made things. This means that I can try them out without being influenced by the price. For instance, the interconnects might be £50/pair or £1000/pair, I truly don't know. I do know that they're noticably better than the Solar Wind i/c I've been using on my CDP, and probably quite a bit better than the Mogami mic cable with bullets I use between pre- and power-amp. Thing is, in absolute terms they are better, but not knowing the price means that I can't make the 'is it worth the money' call. So, a double edged sword, but interesting nonetheless.

I suspect the ball bearing things are the biggest improvement. Only one set, so stuc them under the preamp and everything got that bit more focused and I heard deeper into the music. When you touch the preamp, though, it now moves back and forth on the bearings. Very odd, but kinda cool in a geeky kind of a way!

John

 

John,

Are the ball-bearing supports the Symposium block/bearings or the Final Daruma ones ?

Very interest in these.

As for Nordost - I attended one of their demos at a show a few years back where they started at a low level and gradually upgraded up to the Valhallas. There were clearly audible changes with each cable loom they moved to. Thing is the gear wasn't the highest of high end either - just a Primare cd/integrated. I have some Blue Heaven ics but not that keen on them - currently gathering dust.

 

The ball bearing supports are... (pause while I go downstairs to look at the box) ...FIM 305 Isolation Platforms. Described as "six hardened, steel plated copper cups and three precision grade tungsten carbide balls" - which together form three feet, a little fiddly to setup but when done the whole caboodle can be pushed and it sways from side to side for up to 10 seconds, which I think is the point. Looks really odd, but I'm not really once for gimmicks but these seem to do something pretty clever...

 

I'm not doubting their effects but that sounds like the kind of thing where you pay by the letter

 

Wadia priest is right, etched (and headaches) is the word.

Carl

 

I dont see that system price has much to do with the justifiable cost of cables. Is it justifiable to say that spending £10K on peter belt treatments is valid for a £100k system? No way - as its utter nonsense in any system. So it is with cables. I have compared nordost with cheap custom built cables and the custom cables won (if anything), at 2% of the price so nordost valhalla cannot be justified in any system regardless of cost. Snake oil.

 

BBV,

I have heard people/reviewers state that the reason someone like myself with modest kit doesn't hear the 'obvious' improvement is down to the fact my kit isn't good enough in the first place - and yes I'm aware of reviewer BS.

However, seeing a cable manufacturer using reasonably priced kit to demo differences (I won't say improvements), is refreshing.

Personally I too have changed from Nordost Blue Heaven to much cheaper cable which I actually think is better.

 

I have also recently attended a Nordost demo, this time with Chord CDP (One?), Chord CPM 2600 integrated and Neat speakers. The sonic differences climbing up the range were significant.

But I have also had a cable shoot-out in my set some months ago. We compared Siltech Classic G5, MIT shotgun and Nordost. From Nordost we had the Tyr IC (not Valhalla I agree, but not far off)) and the Red Dawn speaker cable (we did not have better at hand at the time). What I remember is (and we gave Tyr credit for that) a neutral but very rich sound. I don't know what you guys mean with "etched".

No one of us liked the Siltech (although it's a Dutch product ).
I found the MIT very good in 3D image, palpability and low end extension (really good with Mahler). Most of us liked the neutral, rich sound of Nordost Tyr.

So I seriously consider (once I have the money for it) to upgrade to Nordost Tyr IC and Frey speakercable (Tyr speaker cable would just cost too much).

 

It is like giving your system a bleaching, completely squeakey clean and IMO bright and uncomfortable, and like bleach with germs, it kills the 'life' in the music.

IMO of course

 

Griffo - Yes, the standard emporers new clothes tactic - if you cant see the change there is something wrong with you. If the improvements were obvious noone would be debating it. Its the first line of reply all cable adherents use (in the absence of anything better other to fling around). i.e. anyone who cant hear cable improvements doesnt have a "resolving" system or soemhow their senses are not as descriminating. Interestingly enough psych experiments in the 60s showed that if you took ten people (9 of which were actors and instructed to all give the same incorrect answer) and submitted to them to a set of visual assessment tests of judging the longest line from a choice of 5 say en masse then eventually the odd man out would fall into line even though the answers were obviously wrong, even if they were instructed to pcik the shortest line and say it was longest. So it is with cables, given the pressure from dealers, manufacturers and the hifi press. As goebbels said - tell the same lie often enough and loud enough and everyone will beleive it.

Doubtless nordost have LCR characteristics that accentuate the treble making the sound etched and hence giving an impression of flase detail - this was my experience. The custom cable was actually more detailed but not quite as bright.

 

The Nordost cables have one of the lowest LCR characteristics of all cables in the industry... Surely, they will not work as filters...

Remember, a cable cannot amplify, just attenuate. The Nordost cables might have lower subjective bass output, but they cannot amplify highs...

 

Do MIT still use those impedance matching txs? Those grey boxes you connect at the reviever end? I like those. Still wouldn't pay for them though

 

Yes I agree - they are not amplifying the treble they are pulling back the lower frequencies and hence accentuating the mid and high.

 

I wouldn't necessarily say the higher-up Nordosts (that I've heard) pull back the lower frequencies - but I do agree that the highs sounds very detailed and somewhat crystalline. I've heard it sound great and terrible on different systems, but my thoughts on what I've heard of the Nordost line-up is that they sort a lot of bass bloom issues out 'down below' - and that can be perceived as a lean-ness as perhaps the music we listen to has been mastered to sound 'right' on less expensive systems (and by that token cable looms).

I have to add at this point that I've started hearing the benefits of big power chords - I'm playing with some US-fit PS Audio Reference chords which my mate has loaned to me and I do hear the benefits, though it's subtle. I may have to re-evaluate my power chord stance (formed in the DNM/Naim days) now that I have a system which is partial to a better chord.

Anyway, I digress (but it is my thread so there ) but I'm finding this all very interesting. I had another look at the interconnects and they're by a firm called Black Mountain Cable. Couldn't find any reviews on the web so I've no idea whether they're well regarded or not, but they do sound better than what I have already, for sure.

John