[jimtranr]

After considering my recent settling-time experience with a Delta XC v2 feeding a Delta D6, I decided to hold off on posting a follow-up to my original post on the Delta NR v2 until the new power cord had logged a reasonably significant number of playback hours linking the D6 to my tubed line stage. As I write this, the NR v2 has just put around 120 real-work hours under its NR-buckled VTX-Ag belt. And to my ears the wait has been well worth it.

Cutting right to the performance-assessment chase, if, as has been asserted frequently in this forum, the Alpha-level cables constitute the “sweet spot” of the Shunyata product line, then I believe the Delta family merits, at bare minimum, the designation “sleeper”--in the best sense of the word, as it punches well above its price point in the product lineup in terms of precision, agility, dynamic scaling, and impact in both its XC and NR v2 incarnations.

With the Delta NR v2 feeding the line stage, I “see” the soundfield background not as some iteration of “black” but rather as a formless, wholly transparent void. Minute, low-level detail remains tonally and substantively intact all the way from the program source to the system’s speakers. The absence of extraneous noise (an artifact I typically don’t hear until I notice its absence) eliminates image smear that blurs instrumental and vocal placement, dimensionality, and ensemble layering to a degree which leapfrogs by a substantial margin the already impressive you-are-there sensation I experienced earlier with the Venom NR v10 in place.

Expressed another way, the soundfield has become far less projected into my listening room than organically fused with it with recordings whose production values include the intent to replicate the performance venue with at least a modicum of accuracy. I’m still trying to figure out how, among others, the Concertgebouw, Musikverein, Boston Symphony Hall, Manhattan Center, the ensembles performing in them, and all the air inhabiting those venues have been packed so virtually boundary-free into my 11’x13’x7’8” overstuffed listening space since the Delta NR v2 really began “opening up” after about 80 hours of on-repeat playback.

Readers of my earlier D6 and XC threads may recall how taken I was with the surrounded-by-air palpability of Nicolai Ghiaurov as he sang Khan Konchak’s “Zdorov-li, Knaz?” aria from Alexander Borodin’s Prince Igor (Emil Tchakarov conducting the Sofia Festival Orchestra, Sony CD rip). Well, that was then. I gave Ghiaurov a return engagement after about 90 hours of Delta NR v2 burn-in—and at about 20 seconds into the track uttered a “holy something-or-other” at the in-the-room three dimensionality of the basso. As good as the presentation with the preceding power feed to the line stage had been, it didn’t come close in terms of rendering Ghiaurov as spooky-real. With that came a more granular delineation of both his articulation of the Russian libretto and the nuanced inflections of his voice.

My wife confirmed that impression when I cued up Mirella Freni (Ghiaurov’s second wife) and Christa Ludwig in “Scuoti quella fronda” from Giacomo Puccini’s Madama Butterfly (Herbert von Karajan conducting the Vienna Philharmonic, Decca 24/96 download). “There’s more body, more expression in their voices,” she volunteered without any prompting. She also noted that there was distinctly more separation from and layering of the orchestral accompaniment behind the vocalists.

Downshifting to guitar duet with Carlos Barbosa-Lima and Sharon Isbin performing Antonio Carlos Jobim’s “Luiza,” (Brazil, With Love, Concord CD rip), we both heard the same thing—airier string tone and more substantial instrumental body.

Back to vocal—massed this time--with the Turtle Creek Chorale singing “Make Our Garden Grow” from Leonard Bernstein’s Candide (Testament, Reference Recordings CD rip). Here we heard a quantum leap in spatial presentation, ensemble layering, the delineation of individual voices as well as sub-choirs, and dynamic scaling—all of which, taken together, called up the ghost of “Is it live, or is it Memorex?”...which in this instance tilted decidedly toward the former.

There are two passages in the score of the Leonard Bernstein/New York Philharmonic reading of Hector Berlioz’ "Rackoczy March" (Symphonie Fantastique, Sony Royal Edition SBM’d CD rip) where a concert bass drum lets loose with a few healthy whacks. There’s nothing anemic about the resulting, near-subterranean BOOMs. They cause my wife sitting a couple of rooms away to wonder if I’m messing around with TNT. But as impactful as they are, they’ve always reached my ears as indistinct, almost static monotones. Enter the Delta NR v2 at about 100 hours. Each BOOM is now followed by a clearly-defined sequence of skin-vibrating decay.

Those are just a few examples of the striking improvement the Delta NR v2—in tandem with the XC and the D6—has made in the bedroom audio system’s performance. “Transformative” characterizes the whole of it succinctly...and, uh, I still have the power feed to the DAC to give a thought or two to.