[KJ]

-Kevin

[jimmyp58]

Great summation Kevin.

I am truly amazed at these little pieces of audio dynamite.  I have read a lot of the very positive reviews and I have also recently read a rather negative and should I dare say biased review about a recent jam.  I was prepared for just about anything.

My RM40's have had the fortune of being powered by what I consider some very good amps --- Bryston 14B SST and Krell 400FBP cx since I got them late last year.  As many others have, I became intrigued when I started reading about NuForce at the various venues on the Internet and I thought to myself, there was no way in he*& I was going to miss out on trying these babies on for size and bring them into the fold of the products I offer my customers.  I am no genius but when I made that decision, I should have also gotten on the next plane to Vegas and bet my brains out!

I took them out of the box and fired them up.  To Kevin's point, I noticed a little harshness on the high end about 15 minutes into the demo session.  I didn't put a lot of stock into it knowing I just pulled them out of the box but I did take a mental note as a reference point.  From that point on, whoa......

Kevin has been to my house a number of times including the time he visited me to audition the RM40's when he was deciding on buying VMPS.  So he knew how good the sound was from these speakers.  He's also heard some of the cuts I normally use in my demos so he has a reference point there too.  He came in and I had Mr. Beethoven stuff going and I noticed this boyish grin from ear to ear.  He was astonished.  He said "and that is only after about 1/2 an hour"?!  Yep!!!

The clarity and precision was truly noteworthy and spectacular.  I was concerned going in as to whether these amps could provide a deep and lush bass from the RM40's.  Absolutely zero problems there.  Soundstage, well, OUCH!!  The Ref. 9's seemed to create space in my room that physically isn't there.  The entire spectrum, to me, opened up like I never heard my RM40's sound before --- wider, greater depth, clearer, and so much more apparent.  I truly heard sounds, rifts, instrumentation, etc. that I truly and honestly never heard before.  No joke!

We plan on taking these 'beasts' to a couple other sites this weekend.  We'll listen to them on some RM30's and compare them to a Bryston amp and then onto another stop where we'll listen to them power some Dynaudio speakers and compare the sound to a HALO amplifier.

We'll report back our findings.

This is and was a truly unbelievable experience and I look forward, eagerly, as to how they'll sound in a month from now!

Last night, as Kevin and I were talking, also gave me some marketing 'tricks' that given the circumstance might employ.

Later my friends....

Jim

[rustydoglim]

The warranty is 1 year full and 2 additional year of parts. Our labor charge is very reasonable and it takes 30 minutes to service these amps . Just replace the whole circuit board or power supply. That's it.
So you're effectively getting a 3 year warranty.

[Al Garay]

Great review Jim and Kevin. The VMPS customer base is big, vocal, loyal and should welcome the value your amps offer.

I hope someone in Texas is writing a follow-up review. Unless the pre-release unit was defective, they did not have a good environment to make definitive statements.

Is there anyone in the Seattle area with a Reference 9?

[cryotweaks]

I have used the Nuforce amps with several (5 so far) conditioners.  In my opinion,  passive conditioning is the best way to go as the speed and resolution of these amps demands conditioning equally as adept at delivering clean power. Capacitive filtering is second best, and balanced power is third best. The Large transformer based conditioners just seem to slow the pace, and muddy up the bass.

As always your mileage may vary.

[jimmyp58]

Thanks Al....

[KJ]

Al,

I believe Lee from CryoParts still has the pre-production units from last weekend's jam.  Based on his posts, he will continue to burn them in.  Hopefully they will make it to the NTAJ session this month for another review.  In the interim, we're going to be putting them through some heavy testing this weekend with VMPS and other models.  Stay tuned!

-KJ

[Charles Calkins]

Tweek-geek:
  Please help this ignorant old fool and tell me some more about passive conditioneers. Brands? I assume you sell the products that work best with nuforce amps.

                                  Cheers
                                 Charlie

[cryotweaks]

I don't know if I sell the products that work best, as I haven't tried everything.  I know that the Audience Adept Response worked well, (I don't sell this)  the Walker velocitor was the best, and the BPT units (when the amps were plugged into them) were the least favorable.  I am modifying a Quantum Symphony pro, and I will have more info on how that works probably after the RMAF show.

Oh, I also used some DIY outlet boxes with Bybees on the hot, neutral, and ground.  Those helped out sonically as well.

It would be interesting to see if the Richard Gray units work well with these. Since they are passive, yet incorporate a large transformer.

[cryoparts]

Al,

I believe Lee from CryoParts still has the pre-production units from last weekend's jam.  Based on his posts, he will continue to burn them in.  Hopefully they will make it to the NTAJ session this month for another review.  In the interim, we're going to be putting them through some heavy testing this weekend with VMPS and other models.  Stay tuned!

-KJ

Hello Gentlemen,

Yes, I still have the pre-prod amps.  I have been running them in this week and will listen to them at length this weekend.  I may be able to listen to a production pair as well sometime in the next couple of weeks.  

I have been reading (as time permits) the various threads with interest, and I will say that I heard some things at the Jam that piqued my interest, hence, my desire to listen to them under familiar circumstances to get acquainted with their sound.

Best Regards,

Lee