Cheapo non-speaker speaker cables... if you follow!

[Rich]

I've done a bit more tinkering, and can now say, without any shadow of a doubt, this cable is far, far better than my 'Monster substitute'. I've doubled-up, so am using 2x7.5m runs to my LH speaker, and it's just bloody terrific! There was nothing wrong with the sound before - absolutely nothing. But the side with the new cable feels like it's got the last piece of the jigsaw fitted. Everything feels more realistic - bass is clearer, and the midrange and top-end feels more relaxed. It does a stunning job of delivering the soft female vocals('Back to avalon', Heart, 'Desire walks on'), imaging is just sublime - it feels accurate and tight('Why worry', Dire Straits, 'Brothers in arms') - everything just feels better. It's only a 5-10% improvement over my older cable, but it is a distinct change, and not an expensive change to try.

Downside is the cable is very bulky and awkward.

Sounds stunning though. Absolutely stunning. Would love to hear the thoughts of anyone else who tries it out. My cable was 50p per metre from Wilkinson - it's 250V mains cable, rated at 20A. Works out cheaper than the 30A cable, even when doubled up.

Cheers!

--Rich

 

[Odd I/O]

Interesting stuff---
I use mains wire for speakers and have never noticed any difference between it and the more expensive dedicated speaker cable brands out there of equivalent guage. One thing I can say about the dedicated speaker cable is that it does have better conductance than mains cable because each individual strand is a smaller strand; therefore the strand count is higher in speaker cable than in mains cable. While this is an important factor in conductance, It has always been non-noticable to me as far as the sound I actually hear. they both sound the same to me even though technically "on paper" the speaker cable is better.
Using Cat5 cable for speakers, In theory, could possibly effect the sound of the speakers. This is because CAT5 uses individually insulated twisted pairs of wires which causes a small degree of inductance in the line from the twists and a small amount capacitance because of the dialectric gap between conductors. These factrors increase with the length of the cable. It depends on MANY other factors, so there are three possibilities:
1) has no effect at all
2) has a degrading effect
3) has a beneficial effect
---It all depends on the thousands of variables from system to system.

The SINGLE most important factor after guage of wire in speaker cable it so make sure that there is good physical contact between the stripped wires and whatever terminals that they are connected to. ---and make sure that the stripped ends have not oxidized. if they have, just clip them off and strip a fresh length.

 

[stuartk]

I'm actually still playing with it - I have one set-up with each speaker terminal powered by a single twisted pair; One set-up with three twisted pairs braided feeding each speaker terminal; And one set-up with the cable still in the blue sheath and the stripes/solids split for pos/neg, one cable per speaker.

They all sound nice and clean, and I haven't done a side-by-side comparison. It was such a big leap from my ZIP cord I haven't been "moved to improve" yet. It'll come... :yes:

The next step is likely to be trying 30ga magnet wire twisted for the interconnects... :scratch2:

Twisting the conductors only works with a balanced connection. For normal RCA stereo cables (unbalanced) it does no more than look pretty.
Unshielded cables are generally a bad idea anyway.

Why not just get some Belden video cable and stick some RCA ends on that? 1505F works really nicely. If you can't source Belden in the UK, there should be some cable made locally that's comparable.