Official Nu Force discussion thread at HTG

[sikoniko]

I remember reading somewhere that the SE comes only in a unique copper color that makes it stand out from the rest of the equipment in your rack.

that is true if you buy one new, but if you upgrade a current one, you keep your color, or can get a new faceplate.

[tec333]

Dr. J,

If the SE is indeed a marketing move - I do agree with your comment above.

As a marketting move - NuForce might be better off developing a bigger form factor and putting a 100 pound weight inside of it. This might convince some people who are skeptical to try these amps out. - hehe

[GregLett]

Dr. J,

If the SE is indeed a marketing move - I do agree with your comment above.

As a marketting move - NuForce might be better off developing a bigger form factor and putting a 100 pound weight inside of it. This might convince some people who are skeptical to try these amps out. - hehe

Very true tec. Some folks (I used to be one of them) only get excited when equipment, is BIG and heavy.

[DrJRapp]

I used to be part of the big and heavy camp too. Then space issues forced me to substitute a Panasonic XR-25 for a Denon 3801 in my MBR.... The rest is history.

[EAmin]

Jason, a question on the AVP16. Any plans to introduce it in silver?

[RebelMan]

Very true tec. Some folks (I used to be one of them) only get excited when equipment, is BIG and heavy.

What persuaded you to feel differently, nuforce?

[tnt]

Big iron amplifiers always scare me away. Never want to break my back nor my bank account. I'm NuForce amp owner and listen to them 12 hrs a day.

[GregLett]

What persuaded you to feel differently, nuforce?

Yes they did. I had a brief demo with them before I purchased my XT4's
and I was quite surprised. I'm having them this weekend to hear how
they perform with the XT's. I've heard nothing but good, so I expect
to be pleased.

[nfjason]

Answer to several questions posted here:

1) SE is not a marketing gimmick. I will admit that it started out with that intention. But it turns out differently. In terms of sonic performance, Ref 9 probably rank top 5 in the world. I would say the 9 SE should be on par with the best amp at any price. Performance at this level is hard to differentiate unless you have world class system throughout. We weren't joking when we stated that on our website. The upgrade path is always there (unless you insist on copper color SE).

2) When we started out with amp development, a lot of people told us not to be different and go with linear power supply to make the amp heavy. We have a bigger picture in mind than just becoming a niche amplifier company. It was risky to price such a high performance amp at this price point.
But I think all is history now. We have shipped amps to more than 25 countries within a year and we can hardly meet the demand. As more people started to appreciate its performance and value, the word spread like wild fire (still spreading fast ).
There are other unconventional things such as disclosing our version number and offering small upgrade for free, standardizing on the same design for a whole series of amp, offering upgrade path for every Ref series etc.
From day one we want this company to be different. Every product that we produce has to be superior to everything else on the market in its price range.

We do have plan to offer high power amp but as many people have found out, 160W at 8 ohm and 300W at 4 ohm is more than enough for most speakers. We need to take into consideration upgrading all exsiting amps's power supply so designing a very high power SMPS is not a weekend job .

Besides amplifier, you're going to see more breakthrough from Nuforce in 2006.

Jason

[gostan]

Answer to several questions posted here:

1) SE is not a marketing gimmick. I will admit that it started out with that intention. But it turns out differently. In terms of sonic performance, Ref 9 probably rank top 5 in the world. I would say the 9 SE should be on par with the best amp at any price. Performance at this level is hard to differentiate unless you have world class system throughout. We weren't joking when we stated that on our website. The upgrade path is always there (unless you insist on copper color SE).Jason

Jason, I am planning on sending you my Ref 9's for upgrade to v. 9.02 in about ten days, so I am interested in more information about what the sound differences might be achieved with my existing system; if I decided to have you upgrade my existing 9's to the SE version. I will email/contact you to discuss. But based upon the SE comments to date, I would ask you if anybody outside of NuForce has listened to and reviewed the SE editiion.

[DrJRapp]

SE is not a marketing gimmick.
Jason

Nobody ever said it was a marketing gimmic. It exists to promote and give greater prestige to the entire product line, just as any "flagship" product does.

Another good example of this is the Corvette. The Vette is a world class vehicle capable of holding it's own with the worlds best at a rock bottom price. The G06 corvette is probably amongst the top two or three sports cars in it's class in the world. Does anyone honestly believe that Chevrolet makes any money on the Vette, especially the G06? No, it exists to promote the market visability and prestige of Chevrolet and GM, which it has done successfully for 50 years.

I don't think that NuForce needs to deny the value of the SE as a marketing tool. There is no shame in that.

[nfjason]

So far only one person outside of Nuforce has heard of the SE. He is an "extreme" golden ear that have been follwing our amps since 2005. According to him, Ref 9.02 is good but not good enough to match his reference amp (everything he owns were custom mod by the original equipment designers). The SE satisfied him and he has been looking forward to the release. With every little changes that we made in our amp since day one, this guy was able to give us a very detailed criticism in every aspect of listening test, even down to a particular musical instrument (or vocal) and certain node. Besides measurement tests, we have been able to see how how the amp evolved from listening perspective in a very precise manner. SE is pretty much flawless to him.
There will be a flood of public SE reviews in the next few months. But we have to keep emphasize that to hear the difference, you need a world class system.

[Kobus]

Cover of our (South African) AV mag.

Notice the bold statement.

(The link to the review is listed earlier in this tread in a post by ShadowZA.)

Kobus

[Race Car Driver]

Thats a great cover!
But more power is NEVER a bad thing... give me more!!!

Want lots for my 802s!

[RebelMan]

I'm having them this weekend to hear how
they perform with the XT's. I've heard nothing but good, so I expect
to be pleased.

So what the verdict? By the way, I am on the demo waiting list so hurry up with your evaluation, jk - take your time. LOL

[Navy]

Hi. Have you, guys, got any experience of pairnig Nuforce Ref 9 with Thiels CS 2.4? I think of such system with CD Audio Analogue Capitole Sign mkII.
I count on the tube / hybrid warmth of AA Capitole to soften slightly the highs of Nuforce. The room (35 sq.m.) is big enough for Thiels I guess, however the CS 2.4 seem to sound a bit bright. Give me your feedback on that, pls.

[DrJRapp]

I've heard the Theil 2.4 and I don't consider it bright. Are the Thiels and NuForce a recent addition? I noticed that your profile says you are (were) used to listening to a Rotel 1075 which is an amp that has a somewhat rounded top end. The Ref9s may SEEM brighter than the 1075 but only because the 1075 is rounded. I used to have a 1075 and now own Ref9s myself so I know what each sounds like.

[Navy]

Thanks for your reply, Jerry. Thiels & NuForce are going to be a separate system, for stereo only. I am in progress of a series of auditions to assemble it. I leave Rotel & co. untouched for multichannel & HT. What I expect from my future stereo is, apart from even higher fidelity, a different music presentation to the one offered by Rotel & Audio Physic.

[DrJRapp]

Thanks for your reply, Jerry. Thiels & NuForce are going to be a separate system, for stereo only. I am in progress of a series of auditions to assemble it. I leave Rotel & co. untouched for multichannel & HT. What I expect from my future stereo is, apart from even higher fidelity, a different music presentation to the one offered by Rotel & Audio Physic.

I did something similar. My Ref9s arfe used in a separate 2 channel setup featuring B&W speakers and a Shanling CD player. Unfortunatly, that system lit my interest in making the HT system sound equally as good.

[tboooe]

hey rebelman...say it aint so! are you potentially going over to the dark side?? jk. I am very interested to hear your opinion of the nuforce with the b&w. when do you think you will get the demo?

one of my big concerns with the nuforce is whether or not it has enough power to really drive the 802D speakers.

[RebelMan]

Hey tboooe, my auditions with Classe's CDP-100, CP-500 and CA-2200 has established itself as the reference system. I want to give every opportunity that I can to other competing brands that have earned an esteemed reputation, like the nuforce Ref 9's has in recent months, before making up my mind. I am second on the waiting list. Word has it that I might take possession of the demo later this week or early next week.

I don't believe the Ref 9's will have any trouble driving the 802D's. This is not to say that a person still couldn't clip them, I just doubt that a "typical" listener ever would.

P.S. Jerry's ML Summit's are far more demanding than the 802D's are. Once he gets his Summit's patched to support the Ref 9's, maybe he can enlighten us?

[Race Car Driver]

Im not a typical listener, where can I get 500 watts!?!

[DrJRapp]

P.S. Jerry's ML Summit's are far more demanding than the 802D's are. Once he gets his Summit's patched to support the Ref 9's, maybe he can enlighten us?

The only thing demanding about The Summit is the fact that they are rated 4 ohms, which means that some unstable amps may not be able to drive them successfully. The LF drivers have their own built in amps, 2/200 watters per speaker (ML uses the same icepower modules as B&W uses in their subs). The Summit comes with recommended power requirements of 100-300 watts. That means if I were to power them with the Ref9s, the Ref9 is at the top of the ML recommended power (300 wpc @ 4 ohms). At that level there is really a total of 700 watts driving each speaker. 400 for the bass and 300 for the mids & highs.

One area I would agree that The Summit is more demanding than the 802D is in how clean the power is. Since The Summit is a much more responsive (quicker) speaker than the slow responding diamond tweeter of the 802D The Summit will tend to reveal shortcomings in the electronics chain much sooner and with greater detail than the 802D will.

[RebelMan]

The only thing demanding about The Summit is the fact that they are rated 4 ohms, which means that some unstable amps may not be able to drive them successfully. The LF drivers have their own built in amps, 2/200 watters per speaker...

Oops, I neglected to consider this "little" detail. ops:

[RebelMan]

Im not a typical listener, where can I get 500 watts!?!

LOL, maybe at "Driver's-R-Us" :lol:

[tec333]

overheating...

I am putting in a call to NuForce and will try to ask for Jason.

I saw some previous posts of the units overheating in an enclosed cabinet, stacked in a tight spot. Can you anyoune let me know what was happening when these units overheat?

I need to check and see if the symptoms I am seeing is from overheating or if I just have a bad unit.

I have three ref 9's stacked up, it is not in an enclosed cabinet. I think it might be an issue when you stack these amps up. It is the unit sandwiched in the middle that starts acting up after about 2-3 hours of use. The amps have not been fully run in yet - maybe 30 hours of use - I highly doubt it is the break in though.

I'll let you guys posted.

[tec333]

The guys at NuForce are pretty easy to deal with and they do get back to you quite fast! I guess this is a big plus dealing with a smaller company.

As I suspected the symptoms I was hearing were from overheating, I will try to stack the amps vertically to see if it alleviates the problem - I might also try putting them in a pyramid formation.

I was also informed by Jason that Nuforce will be selling a bracket for these ref 9's to stack them vertically.

Jason - any pics of this bracket and also how much?

I think you should just throw in the brackets for customers who purchase 2 or more of these amps!

Tec

[DrJRapp]

Even though the amps are highly efficient they still have some internal loss that gets converted to heat. The thermal design of the Ref9 is such that it relies on both the top and bottom skin to dissipate internal heat. When stacked, a large amount of that surface area is lost due to the proximity to another surface at similar temperature. I'm the engineer that came up with the verticle stacking solution. Stacking the units vertically on their sides with approximatly 1" separation creates air movement between the units due to chimney effect.

[tec333]

Dr J

Some common sense and some physics...regardless good thinking and thanks for coming up with the idea.

I will try it tonight and I am pretty confident it will fix the issue.

Dr J, do you have the Summits powered by the ref 9's now? I know you mentioned there was an issue on the ML side of things. If so how do they sound. I am very interested on your thoughts regarding this pairing. I plan to upgrade speakers pretty soon and the Summits are on my list along with Von Schweikert VR4's and B&W 803D (or old N802's if I find them - very scarce these days).

Also, NuForce recommends powering the amps off when your pre/pro is powered off. Do any of you follow this recommendation or do you just keep the amps on 24-7?


Tec

[DrJRapp]

Tec

Unfortunatly the appointment with the ML tech needed to be rescheduled. The parts (new amps) had not arrived by the scheduled date. I'll keep you informed.

I power my amps off. They don't have long warm up issues so why waste even the small amount of power they take while at idle.

[DifferentLee]

I heard the Ref 9.02s in an all Maggie surround system recently and it sounded great. They don't have as nice a midrange or hf as my ARC tube amp but they are very good amps.

[Chris D]

Mmmmm... all Maggie surround system. That's me someday.

[DifferentLee]

Mmmmm... all Maggie surround system. That's me someday.

He has center channel with 1.6s up front and MG12s on the back channels with B&K processor. It sounds incredible.

[DrJRapp]

OK, the tech from Martin Logan was here yesterday and we changed out the power supplies on each speaker to now allow them to function 100% with amps like the Ref9 that present non, standard waveform patterns.

I have to admit I was very impressed with the ML innerds. Top notch electronics including Solen capacitors, very heavy gague wiring throughout, and very well made circuit boards. The two lf drivers each live in their individual acoustic/air space. All of the electronics were shock and vibration maounted so that the vibes generated by the speakers themselves don't shake the electronics to death. Nice touches throughout.

Anyway, I have the Ref9s now playing with The Summits, and I'll give that a day or two and report back.

[David Meek]

One of our members that prefers to remain anonymous has a system of 3.6 mains, 1.6 surrounds and a CC3 center. Talk about WOW! ;x(

Oops, back on topic.

[tec333]

Jerry - looking forward to your comments with the summit/nuforce pairing...

[pembroke]

Jerry
How's the wine - is it corked or is it breathing nicely?

[DrJRapp]

Ok, let's take this slow and easy. First I'd like to make my comments about the Ref9s in combination with the B&W XT4 and Klipsch Ref7 series, and then I'll post another response about the Ref9s with the Summits.

I think that the NuForce amps are a ideal combination with B&W speakers ANY B&W speaker. I've shlepped my pair around from B&W dealer to B&W dealer and auditioned 804s, 803D, 802D and 800D, 703s and of course the XT4s that I own. All the B&Ws are somewhat warm sounding speakers due to their 3 way design and "British" origin. The XT4 especially falls on the neutral side of warm. The Ref9s are VERY neutral, having almost no sound of their own, which I consider ideal. I believe that only transducers or sources should show any sign of having a sound of their own, and control and amplification electronics should be as close to a "straight wire with gain" as can be reasonably engineered. The electronics also need to do this with as little negative feedback as possible.

The soundstage shows great synergy between the XT4 and the Ref9. The conbination sounds "bigger" than it should (and bigger than the XT4s and a Rotel 1080). There isn't a hint of forwardness, nor is there any compression of the soundstage as volume levels increase. The NuForce does great things for the Aluminum tweeters on the XT4s giving them a speed and accuracy (with the resulting clarity) that neither the Rotel 1080 nor the Aragon 3005 can. And the bass, well, I've been impressed with the bass of the XT4 on just about anything I listened to them with, however, the tight control that the Ref9s exert over the woofers is very evident in how tight and well defined the bass is. Kick drum beats are uncanny in their reality, deep plucks of a double bass will reveal not only the sound of the original pluck, but the rasp of the plucker's finger over the string if the sound is there on the recording. There really is that much resolution.

These are not amps that one would want to use to take the edge off harsher equipment, because they won't. They will reveal every detail good, bad or indifferent. They are especially good at revealing difficencies in sound sources and sound producers (speakers). Shortly after I began listening to my Klipsch RF7s with the Ref9s, I decided it was time to get new speakers.... and that will bring us up to the final chapter of my review which I will present in my next post....namely, the Ref9s with my Martin Logan Summits.

[pembroke]

Thanks for sharing this Jerry.
I had a pair of Ref 9's on demo with my 803's, and a Class D amp based on the UcD modules at the same time. One of my local buddies, he used to be a high end retailer, came over and we did a mini blind event with my Anthem Statement P5. We both marked the Anthem (independently) as the best amp, it was the most neutral across the frequency range, the most dynamic and musical - I was suprised how good it was in comparison.
Nevertheless this was only a few hours of listening, and I did find the Ref 9's interesting enough to want to take the Ref 9SE's for a longer spin.
The Class D amp was similar to my Anthem in terms of neutrality, but was flat and unexciting.
To get a significant improvement over my Anthem I probably need to spend a considerable amount of cash, something like the Theta Citadel monoblocks which retail at over $15k. If the Ref 9SE's can do this, at a significantly lower price, then they'll be a real bargain.

[alpina]

is there an independent or even "not-independent" review of the P-8 anywhere on the net?

cheers,

julie

[sikoniko]

are there any reviews of the SE's yet?

[pembroke]

Yes, I would like to get feedback from anyone who's had the chance to listen to the SE's.

[curtis]

FWIW, I currently use NuForce Ref8b's(8.02) and have been very happy with them. That said, after hearing the Bel Canto REF1000, I ordered a two channel amp that uses the ICEpower 1000ASP modules. I hope it is a positive change.

[ShadowZA]

Here's a small article about the Ref 9.02, pointed out to me by a friend:

http://www.hardwareanalysis.com/content/article/1831/