I've no experience with NBS, but lived with Tara The One's,FIM Gold and Nordost Valhalla for extended periods each. As noted, the FIM is very musical and a great cable. The Valhalla was more transparent,more extended top to bottom, faster and had a black background that was noticeably absent when going back to the FIM. The Ones were quieter than the FIM,a tad more transparent, but overall somewhat compressed and anemic sounding in comparison, notably the bass. The Valhalla was the closest I'd heard to no cable at all, and in my system bested the One and FIM. I lastly A/B'd the Valhalla against various levels of Jena Labs cables and felt the Jena's did( or more accurately didn't) everything I liked in the Valhalla, had a blacker background, and most importantly lent a sense of body to instruments that made the Valhalla seem a tad lean by comparison. Also,the overall presentation with the Jena's was more relaxed and natural sounding. These are all fabulous cables and tacitly system dependent. I have a cd front end (Capitole), tube amps (Tenor OTL) and Rockport Antares speakers. The cables may sound different in different configurations, but honestly, the Valhalla, and Jena's in particular, are so neutral I would bet they work well in any system.
