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REVIEW: nOrh 9.0 Speakers Review by bryan at Audio Asylum

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There is something about this speaker that attracted me to them, at it was certainly not their looks (at first, through pics). I first heard about these speakers from a friend who bought one of the first pairs ever produced. He had the wood version, then upgraded to marble. This friend is a fellow Canadian and someone that I trust. However, when he told me that these speakers, which are around 86dB efficient, worked very well with the notoriously fussy to speaker load amps that we both own, the Atma-Sphere M60s, I was skeptical. But still interested, for a few reasons:

1)they are sold direct and represent a potential good value for money buy
2)they use some of the best drivers in the world
3)they are made from a cabinet material that is one of the most inert and resonance-free materials available
4)they are not shaped like a box
5)they have impressive bass response specs for a monitor
6)my Spendor 2/3s lacked the bass I craved

It seemed logical that my 60-watt amps could provide enough current to these speakers in a small to mid –sized room using a near field speaker setup. The only concern I really had was the impedance curve. After exchanging a few emails with nOrh I was able to obtain what I believe to be a reasonable facsimile of the impedance plot. It was not a real, measured one. It was close enough and I figured if I really had a problem with them I’d be able to sell them without losing much since their list price was due to increase by $500 in a month or so. As I was about to make the decision, a review on these speakers was published at TNT-AUDIO. After reading it, I thought “what the hell”, and placed my order. It took a good couple of months for the order to be filled and the speakers delivered.

They arrived in two separate nOrh branded boxes, intact. Packaging was not that high tech, but certainly adequate. The speakers are placed in a specially molded to fit foam cocoon. Unpacking and setup was a breeze.

I placed them on a pair of custom made IronWorx 4 pillar, sand fill able speaker stands that I had made specifically for the nOrhs. The stands had a larger than usual top plate designed to give some room for slippage in case someone bumped them. Each speaker has 4 stainless steel feet protruding from the cabinet with rounded ends and I was concerned that the speakers would be easily moved around the top plate. Luckily I was able to securely lock them in place on the plate buy removing the hex plugs, which are used for sand loading the stands, and resting the feet in the holes.

I broke the speakers in for 48 hours before going any further. As an aside, I am pushing 200 hours on them now, and still going.

The first thing I noticed was a very bosomy bass. Way too much bass. Moving the speakers did not help. I contacted Jason at IronWorx asking for help. I had completely loaded the stands with sand because I was using them with the Spendors which seemed to like that. Jason soused out the situation and suggested I remove half the sand from the stands. HOLY COW, did that make a huge difference. I’ve mucked around with stand loading before but never did hear such a difference. These speakers, most likely because of their mass and resonance-free character, and their metal feet, are very sensitive to stand loading. I can literally tune the sound of my system by adjusting the fill. I passed this on to my friend and he reported similar experiences. I sure would like to know what the current batch of nOrh 9 reviewers think of this and why they did not mention it. If they only knew. I’m willing to bet that the reviewer at the Malaysian Star could have addressed the soft bass he noted, by adjusting his stands.

During all the moving around of the speakers I noticed that one appeared to be much heavier than the other. I weighed them using some cheesey bathroom scales (which don’t get much work around my house) and I found one measured about 57 lbs and one weighed in at about 70 lbs. That’s a big percentage difference. I was frankly very pissed off and was worried about differences in cabinet volumes and QC etc. I emailed Michael and noted my concern. He stated that marble does vary in mass or density from sample to sample and that’s just the way it is with them and that I do not have to worry about anything related to cabinet volume. However, after my experience with the speaker stands and mass in general related to this speaker, I am still concerned.

Another characteristic of this speaker is that it’s very sensitive to placement. It’s like this very sensitive finely tuned instrument and it responds or reacts to what actions are done to it. I found that toe-in is best set to a minimal degree. I also found that more than any other speaker that I have lived with, you must get the exact degree of toe-in set on both speakers in order to get that totally balanced, symmetrical soundstage. You’ll know it when it locks in. I also found that its dispersion characteristics result in a very large sweet spot.

This speaker is a chameleon. Its like it has two polar characteristics. It is a very revealing speaker but its also very, very seductive and emotive. I have used this speaker to help identify a couple of issues with my system and once addressed, the nOrhs switched from being aggressive to being simply sublime. When your system is dialed in, these speakers sound so seductive. Certainly more so than my Spendors. Yet, the nOrhs are also very fast and exciting and explosive.

That’s it for my review to date. I have some issues with two of my three cartridges and the remaining one has some issues with the gain/impedance settings in my phonostage. Listening conditions have not been optimal for the last little while and won’t be for a couple of weeks, so my final take (with more descriptions on sound and less focus on the other stuff) on these speakers is still to come.

As for the looks, you gotta see 'em, to appreciate them.


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Topic - REVIEW: nOrh 9.0 Speakers Review by bryan at Audio Asylum - bryan 14:48:50 01/26/01 ( 11)