Question About NORDOST cables

A pair of 2 meter Frey's for 675. Dude the retail was 2500 from my 3-15-2010 price sheet. For that price you should have gotten 2 pairs (1 spade and 1 banana) for a true bi-wire.

Nordost has announced the Series 2 for the Norse lineup. With that there are plenty of bargains with the originals from authorized dealers. Musicdirect has some brand new ones for 1/2 price.

I personally think you will be quite impressed with the Heimdall speaker cable. I had a demo case about a year ago and for the money Blue haven and Red dawns were not bad but like you noticed lacked the good clean bass and I found both to be bright (not harsh). Baldur was a little better in both the bass and highs but still not great. The Heimdall's and Frey's were a lot better (more 'air' between the instruments and vocals). I had to 'squint' to hear the difference between those 2. Regardless I went for the Frey's and still have them. My local dealer hasn't loaned me a demo case for the new series 2 yet. They are supposed to be a lot better (pricier too). I've also heard Nordost will not offer bi-wire configurations with the new series 2.

I don't recall exactly why Nordost is Not making bi-wire anymore but I think they found there was phase shift with the bi-wires.

Youngatheart - Remember the Frey's are even better - but marginally. I would suggest jumpers - just don't know which ones. Didn't the Paradigm's come with factory jumpers?

As far as compensation from Nordost don't count on it. That could be part of why they are discontinued. The other reason the design is better. It could be too that only the new series 2 exhibit the phase shift. Could be why Synergistic Research adds a jumper to the end of the cable for their bi-wire configuration??

so,I went ahead and ordered a single run of 2 metres Frey's speaker cables for $675. God damnit, I hope this will turn out to be good, or a quit this cables madness for good.

I thought you were looking for a pair of cables. Anyhow it will be a lot better than a Red Dawn.

Bi-wire or not has been hashed over time and time again
http://forum.audiogon.com/cgi-bin/fr.pl?fcabl&1328477568&&&/to-biwire-or-not-
There never seems to be a winner in any of the discussions

Ok I'll try this again. I guess the mods didn't like what I said I guess regarding e-mailing members. Anyhow 675 is half of 1350 so unfortunately I think you may be getting a single cable. Nordost refers to non bi-wired as shotgun. Even at 1350 that is a great price for Frey's. Personally I think the ic is just as important as the speaker cable IF your equipment is up to it. Again the Frey is better but you do have to 'squint' to hear it. In my opinion again if you have cr@ppy equipment high end cables will only bring out the flaws. Where with higher end equipment great cables will let you hear things you didn't know were there. At least that's what I've learned.

675 is half the 1350. I think you have a single cable coming :(.

Like I said earlier "the Heimdall is the best bang for the buck" cable in the Norse series. Honestly I had to 'squint' to hear the improvement of the Frey's over the Heimdall's. Also in my opinion the Heimdall is a big improvement over the Baldur.

The new Series2 Nordost Frey's have a lot more bass and are even more liquid sounding than the originals. But those are not discounted. I have the original Frey's for about 2 years now and just love them. The Series2 are even better with about a 10% increase over the original MSRP.

Youngatheart - Yes the series2 is warmer sounding. To my ears when you have more bass and a more liquid sound I consider that warmer. As far as the originals to me they do have more 'air' between the instruments and vocals with a little more detail. Now to me I call that less liquid sounding. Both are great cables but they very different sounding. More different than going from RD to Heimdall.
Daveyf

Could it be that they were spending more labor on creating the bi-wire end and were not getting compensated for it. As I recall, the cost of the shotgun (single wire...they shouldn't get away with calling it shotgun as it isn't) was the same as the bi-wire ends. Does my theory make sense to everyone?

The cost difference is ONE pair of connectors at one end of the cable and the labor to put them on.

I do agree Nordost calls their bi-wire and shotgun incorrectly. A true bi-wire is 2 separate runs of cables. Many cable companies also refer to that as shotgun. Now if you look at the construction of the original Heimdalls there is 4 groups of conductors. The series2 have 2 groups of conductors. There are less conductors in the series2 but they are a larger awg wires. Heimdall originals have twenty four 24awg wires where the series2 have eighteen 22awg wires. The overall effective gauge stays the same. The Frey2 OTOH has twenty two 22awg wires where the originals have twenty four 24awg wires so the overall effective goes up by 1 with the series2.
http://home.hiwaay.net/~rgs/awgcalculator.html
Is there marketing hype? I'm sure there is in a lot of cases but you really have to compare the originals to the series2 side by side.

As far as Nordost not making 'bi-wire' cables I'm sure it will cost them some business and I can not believe a company would do that without good cause. IMO it can't be to force you into buying 2 sets of cables because of the double cost to the consumer. As far as I can tell they still offer bi-wire in the Vahalla and Odin BUT not in the Leif or Norse2 series.