Hi All,
So I’ve been meaning to partner our demo Chord Electronics mighty Ultima 2 Mono Power Amps with some Wilson’s for a while but I knew we would have our new demo Ultima 2 Preamplifier here soon so wanted to wait till then so we could do a full Chord setup and last week we received our Ultima 2 pre so it was game on, now we normally run the Ultima 2 amplifiers on our PMC Fenestria’s and I can honestly say I have never heard them sound better so I was really keen to give a full Chord setup a listen on our new demo Wilson Audio Alexia’s and I have to say it is a pretty potent combo.
We ran our Melco N1ZH into Chord’s Dave, unfortunately our demo M Scaler is out on loan, then into the Ultima 2 Pre and the Mono Ultima 2 amps all connected up with Atlas Asimi cabling so there was no doubt it was going to sound good but I was surprised how different it sounded to what I’m used to with Wilson’s, now I am used to running Constellation and Audio Research with Wilson’s which are brilliant partnering equipment but this Chord setup sounded so different, now bearing in mind how big these amps are you expect a big and powerful sound, which you get when called for but what really surprised me was how quick and agile they are and there is a real finesse and delicacy, such an open and airy sound with amazing seperation, it is really hard to put into words but as a total system it was captivating on all genres of music and although we normally run our Dave straight into the Ultima amps adding the Pre certainly seemed to open up the soundstage quite noticeably, is it £12,500 better? well that is always a difficult question to answer but putting it in the chain certainly helped make the system more immersive.
I love Chord’s kit, one for the sound but also for the looks, it is un-ashmadley attention grabbing and although our new Ultima 2 setup looks stunning it is the sound quality that really impresses, we will have this setup running permantley once we re-open so please feel free to make an appointment to come in for a listen anytime.
Please find more info on our website below –
https://hifilounge.co.uk/product-category/brands/chord-electronics/chord-electronics-reference/
HiFi News Review
Please also read the HiFi News review of the Ultima 2 Pre and Power Combo which got a 90% rating which is virtually unheard of from Hifi News, Chord really do have a winning combination on their hands here –
https://hifilounge.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/HiFi-News-Ultima-2-and-Pre-2-Review.pdf
Cheers,
Paul.
