Should you really spend 10% of total budget on wires? - Page 2

Don't discount the cheap bridges. Yes, they don't have the conductivity of copper. But considering how long it will take an electron wave to pass an inch or so at a measly .5 times the speed of light I wouldn't be concerned.

There will be no difference between the two configurations, though "would be as beneficial" is a way of saying that.

Another thing you could do (especially if your speaker wires are tinned) is just strip a long length of insulation and run the same wire through the center hole on both posts of a given polarity. Actually, that's probably what I'd end up doing. Simple and cheap.

I'd say yes or even more...IF I am selling the cables to you. Buy from Monoprice or Bluejeans I have everytime and they work excellent.

You can buy Kimber Kable 4PR in bulk for $3/ft and terminate them yourself. So a pair of 8' cables will be 16' x $3 = $48. If you buy more in quantity (over $200 total), you can get 10% discount & free Priority Mail shipping.

Blue Jeans Canare cables 16' x 1 = $22 + shipping.

So for $26 more, you get the mighty brand name & fancy braiding of Kimber Kable.

It won't sound any different than 25 cent per foot zip cord.

But you get the mighty brand name & fancy braiding.

I never said it would.

I think I've done it all. I started with 24 ga zip cord that came with the Sony 5.1 system I bought. Upgraded to 16 ga zip cord when I bought some JBL speakers. Bought the 12 ga zip cord from Home Depot and rewired everything when I moved into a different house. Got a great deal on a set of Monster M2.2 on eBay shortly after I bought my JBL L7. Replaced the 12 ga zip with a Monster M1.2 center cable when Tweeter went belly-up. I did pay $250 for the 8 foot pair of M2.2s and $40 for the M1.2s center. The most I've ever spent for cabling of those lengths BUT I also dropped about $4000 in upgrades. Replaced the Home Depot 12 ga zip cord with 12 ga CL2 when that crap started turning green. Went with 10 ga CL3 when I added 4 more speakers and replaced the rest of the Home Depot 12 ga zip with the scrap 12 ga CL2. I still have the Monster cables for the front three. I guess I've had the L/R for more than 10 years.

I use KnuKonceptz CL3 10 ga and 12 ga. I mainly based my current wire choice on flexibility, gauge needed for length of run, and round rubber sheath. A round molded sheath makes the cable look uniform when covered with TechFlex. The Monoprice and the Tributaries I bought before that had a thin plastic sheath. You could see the twists in the two conductors even when covered in TechFlex.

My resistance for ALL my cables is very low now -- all under 0.04 Ohms -- with the short runs to the Height speakers still split at the wall plate and the long runs going straight through the wall plate.
Edited by jevans64 - 12/28/12 at 12:13am

I could, but you can google it a lot easier.

That's all well and good, but with 4 ohm speakers you can't hear even 0.4 ohms resistance, and it takes a 50 foot run of 16 gauge wire to get that much DCR. I prefer to put my money into things that can be heard.

I've got a couple of degrees in EE so I normally don't "google" things in that subject area. I've seen diagrams of biwired configurations, and I don't see any benefit, theoretical or otherwise. Since you believe there is a theoretical benefit I was hoping you could explain it to me.

That would be because there aren't any, and you have the technical knowledge not to be swayed by the pseudo-scientific piffle spouted by the cable mountebanks who peddle the bi-wire nonsense, the oddiophools who have been hornswoggled by them, and the manufacturers who put bi-wiring terminals on their speakers because they'll do anything to make a sale.

Since we're on the subject of speaker wire, and since I've been asked this question numerous times, does anyone believe banana plugs degrade the sound quality?

this makes me wonder...

i DO use 50ft speaker cables as my amp and speakers are on opposite ends of the room. any diff in moving amp up front near the speakers, then running 50ft inputs to preamp...?

No, but they can't enhance it either, nor will one sound any different than another. 50 ft is about the limit you want to go with speaker cables, not on account of gauge requirements, but because of capacitance and inductance. In pro-sound we typically have the mixing console 100 feet or more from the speakers, so we put the amps close to the speakers, and let the line level sends be the long cables, as they don't suffer from capacitance and inductance even at 500 foot runs. But another consideration is ground looping. In pro-sound all the sends are balanced, so there's never an issue with ground loops. In consumer audio most sends are unbalanced, so ground loops are a major concern. With a 50 foot speaker cable I'd be inclined to leave the amp where it is.

A typical 8-ohm four layer woofer voice coil contains about 120 feet of number 28 solid copper wire.


Maybe my circuit memory is old: but of those two chassis grounds go to grounds with differing potentials: of course you have a ground loop.

Also: this is not reliably a problem unbalanced:
"Many may agree that unbalanced systems are helped by the fact that the chassis are normally not earth grounded. This allows an entire unbalanced system to float with respect to earth ground. This eliminates the potential for multiple return paths for the audio grounding system, since there is not a second path (ground loop) through the earth ground conductor. " - http://www.rane.com/note151.html
Edited by JerryLove - 12/29/12 at 11:04am

thanks bill, point taken...

tho both my integra 80.2 and rotel amp have balanced inputs...

maybe i'll take a drive to parts express and grab a pair of balanced cables...see what happens

as far as balanced connects go...any will do the job?

Any will do, what matters the most is the connectors. I prefer Switchcraft and Neutrik. But both the preamp out and power amp in must be balanced.
Edited by Bill Fitzmaurice - 12/29/12 at 12:30pm

You might want to check "Solutions for Mixed Balanced and Unbalanced Systems" at http://www.rane.com/note151.html