England captain Alastair Cook praised his side's all-round performance as they crushed Australia by six wickets at The Oval.
England cruised past their target of 252 with more than four overs to spare.
Australia posted 251-7 in their innings, thanks to knocks of 66 and 65 respectively from Shane Watson and George Bailey.
But half-centuries from Ravi Bopara (82) and Ian Bell (75) steered the hosts to victory to put them 2-0 up in the five-match series.
"It's nice to get over the line," Cook told Sky Sports. "I thought Ravi especially played really well, and obviously Ian as well.
"A score of 250 is always gettable here at The Oval when you have wickets in hand and the batters did their job.
"Our bowlers also did well. We put that squeeze on between 25 and 35 overs, and that really took 20 to 30 runs off their score."
The third one-day international is at Edgbaston on Wednesday.
And England are potentially just three matches from adding world number one ODI status to their supremacy in Test and Twenty20 cricket.
Whether that happens or not, Bopara is in no doubt about the ability of Cook's team.
"I think this is probably the best side we've ever had," he said.
"The bowlers are performing really well, putting pressure on (opposition) batsmen - and then there's always someone in the top six (for us) that goes on and gets a big score.
"The amount of hundreds we've scored in the last however many games has been incredible."
Bopara was pretty pleased with his own performance too.
"I enjoyed myself out there," he said. "I told myself just to watch the ball, and hit it, and I play my best when I do that.
"I think I'm batting the best I ever have.
"A few changes that I've made over these last six months have really worked for me."
Cook gave his Essex and England team-mate due credit, but was even more impressed with his bowlers - albeit on a pitch which was not quite as good for batting as he first expected.
"There was a little bit of nibble in that wicket, which was pretty much there all game," he said.
"There was a little bit in it for the bowlers - probably a little bit more than we thought.
"But where we were really quite strong today was when Swanny [Graeme Swann] came on. We squeezed really, really well - with a few overs from Ravi as well.
"From 20 to 35 overs, we did that really well, picked up the odd wicket, and never really allowed them to get that momentum going to get a big score."
The outcome was rarely in doubt - although it might have been a little different, had an lbw verdict against Eoin Morgan stood and sent him back for nought to the bowling of Michael Clarke.
Without DRS and Hotspot, which indicated a faint edge, it would have been two wickets in three balls - and a wobble at 171 for four.
Non-striker Bopara was certainly happy to corroborate the decision.
"I don't want to be controversial or anything," he said.
"But I heard two noises, and one of them sounded like wood."
Australia captain Clarke appeared slightly less convinced, but insisted the controversy came too late anyway to have a major bearing on the result.
"I don't think that was a turning point at all," he said.
"We think he didn't hit the ball, but it was hard to see.
"Looking from the ground at a big screen is a lot different information to what the third umpire is receiving when he's right in front of a television. It's probably a lot clearer for him.
"The information I received was that there was clear evidence that he did hit the ball - and I don't think it had any impact on the result of the game, to be honest. We needed to take wickets before that."
Without those early breakthroughs, Australia were never really in the contest - as was also the case, according to their captain, in the series opener at Lord's.
"I think the scoreboard at the first game probably hid how far away the teams were," Clarke added.
"I think England outplayed us at Lord's and they certainly outplayed us here, so we need to get better quickly.
"We've got the talent, that's something I've spoken about for a while. It's now about turning the talent into performances."
