Valhalla 2 Ethernet Cable allows music lovers to fully incorporate digital music storage and streaming into their reference audio systems, while maintaining, and even improving upon, their musical performance.
To meet the objective of high-speed data and increased bandwidth, the Valhalla 2 Ethernet Cable has the advantage of eight, 23 AWG, solid core conductors wrapped in a high-density polymer insulation. These annealed conductors are arranged into four twisted pairs before being triple-shielded. Each of these design aspects minimizes skin effect, eliminates crosstalk and EMI (electromagnetic interference), and ensures a high-performance network cable, offering far more bandwidth than is needed for the typical data demands of today.
To further distinguish the V2 Ethernet Cable from its competitors, Nordost has implemented its unique mechanical tuning process. By meticulously cutting each conductor at calculated and equal lengths, Nordost reduces internal microphony and high-frequency resonance. The precise cut of each conductor, at a length which is determined by the cable’s geometry, material, and application, guarantees the uniform arrival of all signals, dramatically reducing timing errors.
To complete this reference design, the Valhalla 2 Cable is terminated with a completely specialized, gold-plated 8P8C/RJ45 connector, designed to resist ESD (electrostatic discharge) and optimized for mechanical reliability. The resulting cable supports frequencies and transmission speeds that easily meet Category 8 requirements.
The Valhalla 2 Ethernet Cable is designed, manufactured, and terminated in the USA. Each cable is constructed with precision, consistency, and quality fabrication, providing a massive improvement over standard issue, mass-produced, low-precision Ethernet cables.
Reviews
"My time with all the Valhalla 2 cables was musically intensive, instructive and, at times, mind blowing from their wonderful effect on my system. A glorious set, echoed in the marvellous Nordost Valhalla 2 Ethernet Cable ($2,999,99/per metre). If you have a musical, revealing setup with room and system synergy in place, I dare you to hear them in your system. Very highly recommended"
read the review in Audiopilia
"For what Nordost has achieved with the Valhalla 2 Ethernet cable, and what it can achieve, I am more than happy to present the first 2022 Mono & Stereo Highly Recommend Product Award"
read the review in Mono and Stereo
"In soundstage terms, V2 ethernet cable set the panorama gently further back, making a return to reference Cat 5e and Cat 6 cables sound almost unendurably too forward and lairy. It made me wonder how much the Nordost secret of network cable manufacture lay in the latest Category 8 standard, with its additional screening and improved bandwidth. But no, substitution with three different off-the-shelf Cat 8 cables bought in especially showed that while the latter was a trade-up on Cat 5/6 performance, Valhalla 2 ethernet cable was further removed again from any other avalable SFTP cable.
To quantify the changes further, bass replay was notably tighter and better controlled, appearing as essentially smear-free against the bloom of the reference cables. Top-end detail was improved, if more subtly, but enough to make it easier to pull apart ride and crash cymbals in a cluttered rock kit. Noise floors were perceptibly lowered, allowing for a more nuanced ambience, to the point of allowing the character of older recordings’ varied tape hiss to shine through. These kinds of revelations were not at the expense of exaggerating flaws in archive material, merely to make such artefacts’ presence another layer that could be sifted away from other musical strands. In fact, it is the V2 ethernet cable’s very lack of digital edge, of undue emphasis, that makes it a natural performer, and night-and-day A-B demonstrations so easy."
Expectations were kept in check for this review, and yet now I have to concede that this is a network cable that’s not just a bit sonically different, it’s a palpable triumph in digital audio sound reproduction."
read the review in HiFi plus
