The new Sigma NR v2 power cord is near the top of the line of the new Reference Series of NR power cords from Shunyata Research.
The new Reference Series power cords have all new VTX-Ag conductors, CopperCONN connectors, and Shunyata's latest NR noise-reduction technology that significantly reduces noise coming from the component's power supply and going back into the power distribution chain to potentially contaminate other componentry. They are primarily designed to be used for powering components in conjunction with a power distributor, but they can also be used to provide NR for components powered directly from the wall's AC receptacle, e.g. monoblocks or amps that are too far from the location of a central power distributor.
I've had the opportunity to evaluate a production version of the Sigma NR v2 power cord for the last week or so prior to its formal marketing release on April 3, and for the first application, I installed a single power cord to power my Denali 6000/S V2.
From the first moment I turned on the stereo using this power cord, I was...gobsmacked. I've heard some really good power cords in the last 10 years, but in all honesty, I've never heard a single power cord not only bring such a DEGREE of improvement, but also NATURE of improvement, as well.
The new Sigma NR v2 PC brings the type and nature of presentation that I've only experienced from Shunyata devices that have the QR/BB technology. If you've never experienced what a Triton V3, Typhon QR, Denali, etc. brings to the equation, all I can say is that the classic audiophile terminology we've used for the last 40 years simply does not apply any more. Put quite simply, you have to experience it to "get it".
Most of my experiences with great power cords to this point have resulted in a notable reduction in noise, hash, grunge and a concomitant increase in dynamics, slam, ability to scale incredibly quickly without "compression" and resultant improvements in transparency and resolution. Over the years, I've come to the conclusion that power cords are the most important cables in a high-end system for this reason, and, along with the power distributor, should be the first key purchases of a stereo system to provide clean, quiet, and un-restricted power rather than the final "tweak" of a stereo system. You don't build a superb house on a weak foundation, you build it on the best foundation you can for sound (no pun intended) engineering reasons, and the power distribution of a high-end audio system is no different.
But coming back to the Sigma NR v2....
The first time I head this power cord it was immediately apparent that all the adjectives used in audio reviews for this type of product don't apply. The performance and qualities this power cord brings require a new vocabulary as as well as a new perspective because the nature of the presentation is so fundamentally changed.
If there was just one word I was limited to for describing what the Shunyata NR v2 brings its...Verisimilitude.
Def: Verisimilitude – the appearance of being true or real.
There is realness and authencity that this power cord brings that, quite simply, I've never experienced before. Yes, its got all those audiophile adjectives I've referenced above: notable reduction in noise, hash, grunge and a concomitant increase in dynamics, slam, ability to scale incredibly quickly...yadda, yadda. Yep, its got all that stuff in spades.
But, it has other, more compelling attributes, as well. The Sigma NR v2 provides a very 3D-like simulacrum of the musical presentation that is the most holographic, dimensional, pin-point precise I've experienced. While its sounds amazing on all types of content, on full-scale classical symphonic music, you can really hear what the Sigma NR v2 can do.
Listening to Pepe Romero's classical guitar on Rodrigo's
Concerto de Aranjuez by Romero and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields, you can hear the
thickness of the spruce top of Romero's guitar. Moreover, you can clearly hear the individual notes, and the subtlety of the notes he is playing completely clearly and fully resolved even with the complexity and scale the full orchestra is going flat-out during a very dynamic passage. You can actually "zero in" with your hearing to every single instrument in the orchestra, and hear what that specific musician is playing within the context of the symphony overall. Normally, during these types of passages, these small and "intricate" details normally get lost against the background of the entire symphony playing en-masse. Not so with the Sigma NR v2.
The Sigma NR v2 provides a type of "resolution" that quite simply, I've not experienced before. The orchestra can swing incredibly quickly and forcefully from soft to loud and you can still pointpoint and hear "into" each individual musician or instrumental voice. On
Midnight Blue, I can hear the secondary reflection of Kenny Burrell's guitar, which is miked on the left, splay off the far
right wall in the recording studio, for example.
The imaging is also notably improved as well, each musician or instrument being more focused, "palpable'..there's more "meat on the bones" of each instrument, more texture, more timbral accuracy and timbral nuance.
I could go on and on, but to conclude, there is so much more focus, ambiance,
rightness to the presentation that it moves from clean, fast and technical (there's all that, those audiophile attributes, to be sure, but much more) to such a natural and "organic" quality that it sounds as if you are
in the room with the musicians as they create the music that instant. Analogies again fail here but if I had to make them its like going from an Apple iTunes track to listening to the recording's orignal master tapes set up by Alan Yoshida and played back on a world-class Studer reel-to-reel tape deck. Or like looking at a JPEG from a good APS-C camera to a 16-bit TIFF file from a 100 megapixel Fuji GFX100 medium-format camera in Capture One Pro 20.
Really extraordinary.
