Calling all Polkies:Official Polk thread - Page 455

Not sure if you are talking about what I think you may be talking about: There is no such thing as wire 'directionality'.

Well the guy did make custom wires, complete with copper wiring soldered to nothing at all, to replace the copper jumpers on his speakers.....

Still doesn't make them 'directional'. It's A/C. Current flows in both directions. All that was accomplished was effectively using half the actual gauge. While I absolutely applaud the effort and the jumpers look nice, 'if' (I can't stress the if enough) they were done primarily for the 'directionality', I have to ask where the (bad) information is being gleaned from.

I just happened to stumble upon YES-Fragile in the $5 bin at BB last week. I haven't listened to that since selling off most of my vinyl collection a few years ago. Normally I listen to New Age stuff like Enya. My wife gets home and proclaims WOW, THAT'S LOUD, and I said hey, it's rock. It's supposed to be loud!

BTW I just ordered a Denon 3312CI with 125wpc and pre-outs, so maybe I can hook my Crown back up again. The 3312 just went on sale to clear way for the 2013 models, and the Rob Lee Surplus Electronics Store continues to grow in size.

I was saying he's doing something that doesn't make a difference anyway so he might as well go all the way

Thanks for the clarification.

The Audioquest flx wire has arrows on it that they indicate a show the grain of the wire similar to how MIT cables have a amp end and a speaker end. I apologize if my wording didn't make sense

The jumpers were not made solely for the directionality purpose but to replace the stick jumpers I had and to let me practice some new skills. I was originally going to make my own speaker cables with the Audioquest flx 14/4 wire but got a food deal on some MIT exp1 speaker cables so I made some jumpers to replace the stock ones.

Who knows maybe I will redo the jumpers to solder them into the bananas.....

It still doesn't matter. The entire concept of directionality in a speaker cable is complete nonsense. I still don't get why you even made these jumpers to begin with.

The reason for those arrows is to justify the additional cost of their cable, to somehow differentiate themselves as 'special'. Technically its not false advertising as current does flow in that direction, but it flows equally in the other direction as well.

Couple reasons::

1. They are better than the stock brass jumpers
2. Learn to solder and use heat shrink
3. Because I could

we will disagree on the cable topic all day so just leave it be man. I hate when you knock on something just because.

The additional cost? Ha that cable was 75 cents a foot, really? It wasnt much more than the mono price in wall you guys recommend. I got 33 feet of 14/4 CL2 wire for all of 25 bucks.

2 and 3 are fine reasons, but 1 is.... questionable.

Good luck Enders.

Agree to disagree. Back to regularly scheduled programming.

One man's work is another man's play...

so I can see the "why bother" POV as well as the "it's something to do".

+1

Personal accomplishment goes a long way in this and every other hobby I've ever been involved in. Regardless of approach, this should always be appreciated.

If it was my job I wouldn't last long with my current skill level but I am working on it. End goal would be the ability to mod the xovers on my lsis without assistance. Got a couple other projects I would like to do as well along the way

No one is knocking 'just because'. It is simply an opening for dialog about what constitutes fact from marketing fiction.

Directionality and long vs short grain copper are purely in the hocus-pocus / voodoo category.

I have a pair of AQ XLR KK's. Those and $1K wager says no one would ever be able to come over and stone cold 9 out of 10 flips of the coin:

1. Tell me if they were AQ KK's or my own XLR patches
2. Tell me which direction (orientation) I had them wired in

I could use the extra $1K.

As long as it is rooted in fact and proper testing methodology you'll get no argument from the 95% of AVSers

BTW I just wired a sub with some spare 12/3 ROMEX since the cable I brought with me was too short. I would even go so far to say on the Kappa Perfect build none of these 'golden ear' philes could pick out my EXP2's vs ROMEX.

This forum can be such an attacking animal. Simply an opening for dialog? Lets take a closer look at simply an opening


Why don't you just come out and call him a liar? For all you know, Enders is marking his cables because he has a plan for them. He's made them himself, and in his personal design, he may have intended for each end to have specific location.

You and Enders have been around these forums for quite some time, neither one of you are idiots, there's never any need for anyone to even come close to implying that anyone on this forum is, sadly enough, it goes on too frequently.

I did read where Enders apologized for his wording, did that stop the freight train of finger pointing? Nope!! Big bad ass's with vast amounts of knowledge crashing down the righteous hand belittling.

Are you feeling pretty bad ass? You sure look like the authority, oh wait, just another member trying to tear down another member. Sad, sad, sad. How can I help you? By calling you a liar and an idiot? Naw, I didn't think so, that NEVER does any good to anyone!

Maybe we need a $100M government research project to determine whether or not "wire directionality" really does exists. Just think of the millions of engineers all over the world with egg on their faces. "OMG, here we've been doing this all wrong all along!"

Then of course there would be conflicting studies sponsored by the wire mfrs institute which will claim that generic wire is just as effective as brand name wire because it contains the same ingredients.

Then Chris Mathews and Bill O'Reilly will each spout the validity and ridiculousness of the study, and how it (at the same time) created jobs and destroyed jobs. And the circle of life goes on....

Again (I'll even bold it for you Geoff) There is no such thing wire directivity

Next you will want to call me out for stating the world isn't flat. These are matters of fact.

Not trying to tear anyone down. But think about someone that has been fed such a line of crap that they believe that wire has 'directionality' and that stranded jumpers are going to make a difference vs bar jumpers. If that is one's foundation to their approach in audio then that foundation is effed.

Ender left two insulated conductors floating in the jumpers and marked one end as directional. And then went on to talk about MIT and AQ doing this. No there is no correcting or re-wording needed. The intention is clear.

Ender can do what ever he wants. It's public forum. It may spark some questions to be asked however. The only one ratcheting this up is YOU.

Geoff, before you really think that I am busting Enders' chops, I've even offered for him to come down an knock out a small dual opposed 8" sub for the new room.

Jim you may be misunderstanding a bit.

To clarify, I used all 4 connectors in the 14/4 wire for each jumper on each side. Each jumper is one length of 14/4 gauge wire combined into one strand at the end. Each end is tinned and connected to the locking banana via screws. The entire assembly is the wrapped in nylon tech flex and heat shrink.

However that doesn't change the fact we don't agree in some subjects in this hobby and that's ok. My issue was not with you his time as while we can agree to disagree you at least didn't knock my attempt to learn to DIY something despite our difference of opinion.

Others however felt the need to.

You have to mess around in this hobby. Lord knows I have been through about 13 brands of amp to date. Thanks for the clarification on the jumpers.

Does current flow negative to positive (electron theory) or positive to negative (hole theory)... LMAO

I couldn't resist.

Yup, after electron flow made so much sense for vacuum tubes, we all had to become accustomed to thinking in terms of hole flow in order to understand why the symbols for PNP and NPN point the way they do.

Yeah, I feel ya. Academia still used hole theory. The military, on the other hand, teaches electron flow (covalent bonds and negative to positive). I taught communication-electronics maintenance for four years and talking to engineers is a challenge sometimes.

It is odd, telling students that the diode arrow was written for hole flow, and we use electron flow so current flows in the opposite direction. When you think about it, it is potential that is changing at either end, the middle is just subatomic magic that we still don't quite understand... LOL

I love seeing people craft and create their own equipment as I am a bit of a hobbyist with electronics myself. I custom wired my entire computer (short of a couple of hard-wired power supply cables) to make them the exact length I wanted. I soldered the gold plated connector pins prior to crimping to reduce electrical resistance. I used 12 AWG wire (UV reactive) and covered them with UV sleeving and heat shrink because I like the glow. Was it necessary, without extensive testing and a control, no one will ever know. It gives me peace of mind and that is hard to put a price on. I am by no means an audiophile (or phyte) and probably never will be. I love music, that sounds good, and enjoy the feel of the music... You guys are all great and this is a really good forum. A little bit of diplomacy, tact, and use of kid gloves goes a long way when two grown men are chatting... LOL

It's cool, I'm well aware of your first statement in this quote.

Not trying to call you out for stating something that isn't true, on the contrary, it was obvious that your were trying to nail Enders to the cross. Making a statement once should get your message across, when you drive it home and hang someone in public for it, well, that's just not cool.

I have been listening to my RTi A9s quite a lot in the past few days and couldn't be happier. I look around the forum and notice that most people are running theri RTi A9s with dedicated amplifiers. My receiver pumps out 140 WPC and is biamped (not sure exactly how much power that provides but it makes a difference) but was curious how much overhead the Emotiva XPA-2 will give me. I do notice at high volumes (90 - 95 dB on the receiver dial) I start to get a little bit of distortion. I assume that the distortion comes from the receiver's amplifier trying to provide the voltage but not being able to keep up with the current demands. The NR3009 has a huge, high current transformer, but the RTi A9s can take a lot more than the receiver can dish out.

My big question is, how much improvement in dynamic range and overhead will I gain by adding the XPA-2 with it's true 300 WPC capacity? Let's say I listen to a CD at volume level 82 dB (my receiver's THX reference level). If I add the XPA-2, will I have dramatically higher sound pressure and improved dynamics at the same receiver volume level? Don't get me wrong, the speakers can make your ears bleed at these levels if you are sitting on the couch in front of them. I am curious how much more I can crank them with the dedicated amp. These speaekrs are rated for 500 WPC (not sure that's even sane, but they can take it). I have seen some Youtube videos of my speakers with the XPA-2 and the drivers are rocking, but sound will never be accurately demonstrated on a video without high quality cameras and sound recording microphones.

I know some of you guys have these same speakers with Emotiva amps. What is your opinion? What are the levels you experienced without the amp and what are the levels with the XPA-2?