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While this statement may be true, it remains baseless supposition. The facts of the matter are that Freedon Nadd "has knowledge of" the disciplines described in the Tales of the Jedi Sourcebook, and certain unknown others found in "ancient Holocrons and tomes" (which remain undefined, and are therefore worthless in concrete terms); in contrast, Palpatine "has mastered nearly all the known powers, previously unknown powers, and devises new ones at his pleasure." On the basis of these two statements, the probability is that if Nadd knew of a discipline, Palpatine has probably mastered it ("nearly all the known powers"). If Nadd did not know if it, Palpatine has probably mastered it ("previously unknown powers"). If Nadd never imagined it, Palpatine may well have invented it ("and devises new ones at his pleasure").

The evidence does not support the suggestion that Freedon Nadd had access to greater stores of knowledge than Palpatine. Freedon Nadd never even achieved the rank of Jedi Knight; the Dark Empire Sourcebook calls Palpatine a Jedi Master. The distinction is not insignificant: Revenge of the Sith reveals that a Jedi's access to Holocrons was restricted by rank (hence Anakin Skywalker's outrage that he was denied the rank of Jedi Master -- without it, he could not access the Temple's most valuable Holocrons to search for a way to save Lady Amidala's life). Nadd trained for some unspecified time under the reigning Jen'ari, Naga Sadow, but did not finish his training, and scavenged Sithian artifacts from various ruins; his training was restricted to incomplete terms under the Jedi and Imperial Sith, with whatever trinkets he could find along the way.

Palpatine, in contrast, had access to the Sith Archives (Episode I Journal: Darth Maul); his lair in the Chancellor Palpatine Surgical Reconstruction Center had "archives, Sith Holocrons, and other artifacts," an "environmentally controlled display case for Sith Scrolls," and a "massive Sith Holocron uncovered on Korriban" (Complete Locations). The Imperial Citadel on Byss was equipped with "a full library of Dark Side texts for the master's personal study" (Dark Empire Sourcebook), and he was said to have spent "decades studying the most arcane and esoteric Jedi disciplines" (id.). He gained access to all of the Temple's holocrons, including the "restricted holocrons" with "the deepest secrets of the greatest Masters of the Force" (Revenge of the Sith), which even included "the only known [to the Jedi] Sith Holocrons, whose very existence is revealed only to a handful of Jedi at the highest levels" (Attack of the Clones: The Visual Dictionary), and he went on to seize Bodo Baas's holocron from Master Jedi Ashka Boda (Dark Empire). Palpatine "gathered the greatest works of knowledge from over a million worlds" and "studied the Force in all its guises throughout the galaxy, whether it was the shamanism of the Jarvashqiine or the tales of the Tyia," so that he "had long ago gone beyond any knowledge to be found in the recovered teachings of the Krath or the Heresiarchs" (Dark Empire Sourcebook), and is known to have "studied [the Sorcerers of Tund] prior to their destruction" (The New Essential Guide to Characters). He recruited those who "had already mastered the unique sorceries of their own species" as his dark side adepts "as much to study their knowledge as to train them in his" (Dark Empire Sourcebook).

The evidence is quite clear. Palpatine's study of the Force is the most in-depth and wide-ranging ever seen in the whole of the canon, literally embracing millions of worlds and cultural traditions well outside the range of the Jedi and the Sith (both the Ordinal Sith and the Imperial Sith). No other character is known to have spent such effort and such time to the collection and integration of such a vast store of knowledge -- what's more, Palpatine is known to have been active in his studies, integrating and refining the wildly varying cultures into his "Science of Darkness," documenting much in his Dark Side Compendium (in fact, it is known that Palpatine's writings were sufficiently thorough that reading one of his books could give one a working knowledge of alchemy andits application to biological engineering).

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Originally posted by Darth Maliko
I say Caedus. And I am NOT a Caedus fanboy. In fact, I despise him.
I say it because he knows of techniques that nobody in the Order have heard of and knows more of them.

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Originally posted by Elite Hunter
Ok so the consensus seems to place Sidious number one. I am now interested you think take the next positions(2nd,3rd,etc.) behind him.

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Originally posted by Darth Maliko
I say Caedus. And I am NOT a Caedus fanboy. In fact, I despise him.
I say it because he knows of techniques that nobody in the Order have heard of and knows more of them.

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Originally posted by Kadesh
Most Knowledgeable - Odan Urr, considering how he literally sat on his ass on the Jedi's greatest source of knowledge there's ever been for centuries studying all that he could.

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Originally posted by Kadesh
Most Knowledgeable - Odan Urr, considering how he literally sat on his ass on the Jedi's greatest source of knowledge there's ever been for centuries studying all that he could.

Broadest Knowledge - Sidious, for reasons already stated.

Ignoring anybody who you'd classify an "Ancient" Force User as well as Jacen and Sidious (due to their extremely broad range of knowledge) however, I think it's safe to say that Bane would come next, given how he possessed all of Sadow's knowledge via Freedon Nadd's holocron as well as the greatest and best that Revan had to offer, an extremely strong thirst for knowledge, and an insane learning rate that could easily compensate for an arguable lack of learning time.

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Originally posted by Gideon
I wonder if Jocasta Nu would apply as well, then.