Speaker cable gauge considerations

[HiFi in WYO]

Empiricism ..That is the way to answer questions ..
All Due respects mister ..

Gotcha. So if there is any effect, it's slight. I think there is a bit more clarity, that may be my wanting there to be. Twisted both and I'm truly blown away by what is being revealed, effortlessly. For reference, I'm running a Yamaha AS-500 amp, with a same generation Yamaha CD player to a pair of KEF 105.1s with new caps on the mids and highs. Everything is there, pronounced and clear. Even more so than with the Monster XP cables I was using, and again, I was happy with the sound from them. This is even mo' better sound!

 

[Akustic]

Gotcha. So if there is any effect, it's slight. I think there is a bit more clarity, that may be my wanting there to be. Twisted both and I'm truly blown away by what is being revealed, effortlessly. For reference, I'm running a Yamaha AS-500 amp, with a same generation Yamaha CD player to a pair of KEF 105.1s with new caps on the mids and highs. Everything is there, pronounced and clear. Even more so than with the Monster XP cables I was using, and again, I was happy with the sound from them. This is even mo' better sound!

Amps and loads .. the only way to really tell is to mess with it in your system..
Over the past couiple of weeks, I was messing with 3 different twisted cables, plus a Canare 4s, and a flat parallel pair of 12ga high strand count OFC and 3 different amps.
Surprised me when clarity improved with the twisted wire into the two SS amps, but it muddled the tube amp ..
Exact opposite with the tube amp and the parallel stranded wire.. the tube amp smoothed, clear and high, and the SS amps muddled.. go figure
I just keep swapping until I find an improvement .. (and send the leftovers back ).

 

[Akustic]

Gotcha. So if there is any effect, it's slight. I think there is a bit more clarity, that may be my wanting there to be. Twisted both and I'm truly blown away by what is being revealed, effortlessly. For reference, I'm running a Yamaha AS-500 amp, with a same generation Yamaha CD player to a pair of KEF 105.1s with new caps on the mids and highs. Everything is there, pronounced and clear. Even more so than with the Monster XP cables I was using, and again, I was happy with the sound from them. This is even mo' better sound!

Sometimes I think that some of the equipment reviews that I read here may really be limited by the sound of the cabling, but that's a topic unto itself ...

 

[HiFi in WYO]

Yes. I can see that. I'd add caps too.

 

[Guest159]

More clear and articulate in a 10.5 run? Yeah, no.

Unlike your denial, I can prove it.

 

[DaveVoorhis]

I've always wondered about the bit wire in the speaker cabinet , usually a lot thinner than even 18 gauge I assume ?

It is.

And inside the output transistors in your amplifier there are wires that are even thinner.

Wire resistance is proportional to length and inversely proportional to diameter, so a thin short wire (like that in a speaker cabinet or inside a transistor) can have the same current carrying capacity as a long fat wire (like a speaker cable.)

 

[DaveVoorhis]

There certainly isn't any voltage difference between a braided or twisted cable and an unbraided cale but there's a sonic difference

If there's a sonic difference, it must be due to a voltage difference.

But make sure there is a sonic difference. How have you verified that there is a sonic difference?

 

[HiFi in WYO]

Ears?

But in my experiment with the THHN wire, I couldn't really tell much. Braided or not, they both seemed to sound the same. But my perception was there might have been slightly more fullness of the sound with the twisted cable. Again, we're talking about a good 28 foot run to each speaker with 12 gauge wire. Now they're both braided and I'm very happy.

 

[rothwellaudio]

If there's a sonic difference, it must be due to a voltage difference.

There have been amps from some quite well-known manufacturers which were prone to blowing up if the wrong cable was used and they would specify that the customer must use their proprietary brand of cable. I even heard of Quad amps going into shut-down with some cables. Some amps just can't cope with much capacitance at their outputs. What happens when there's not quite enough capacitance for catastrophic failure, but more than there would be with different type of cable?
Btw, I don't know the answer to that.

 

[Guest159]

Many, if not a majority, of boutique cables err on the side of high capacitance because the capacitance is easier to drive than inductance. Hulking cable conductors present significant inductance to high frequencies where music has the least energy, whereas capacitance is easily charged by the frequencies that have good to high energy preventing it from impacting the definition of high frequencies.

Braiding, in theory, mitigates inductance and crosstalk which is why it's used in practically every interconnect cable I can think of. USB, serial and parallel SCSI beyond Ultra2, twisted pair phone line, Ethernet, SATA, HDMI, and so on. I'm not sure it made much difference compared to the 12g and my braided beasties in the bass region, but the upper mid-range and treble are crisper and clearer in an immediately obvious way. I'm 100% confident I could identify my cables next to a 12g cable of the exact same length. The difference is that obvious.

 

[Akustic]

I've left the reasons why as an open question, for decades since it's impossible to sort out the BS that comes from cable manufacturers ..
But the differences are certainly hearable so I just use my ears, and keep experimenting with them ..
When it sounds better, it is better ..
And I always appreciate these conversations because people keep trying different things ..
Haven't tried Cat 5 yet, but I'm gonna ..

 

[toddalin]

When it sounds better, it is better ..

No, what sounds louder, sounds better, even if if is not the case.

You may create an elevation somewhere in the bandwidth rendering a portion of it being louder, and this will sound "better" to the ear, even if the bandwidth is not as linear.

 

[Akustic]

No, what sounds louder, sounds better, even if if is not the case.

You may create an elevation somewhere in the bandwidth rendering a portion of it being louder, and this will sound "better" to the ear, even if the bandwidth is not as linear.

Perhaps.. it's certainly possible to be mistaken for a moment in a direct A/B comparison if a person isn't aware of level matching in a direct comparison ..
But that doesn't exactly apply to extended listening ..
I've been at this for 40 years ..
As always ..
YMMV ..
What is truly tricky is figuring out which component is contributing what ...

 

[Akustic]

If there's a sonic difference, it must be due to a voltage difference.

But make sure there is a sonic difference. How have you verified that there is a sonic difference?

Does EMI or RFI change the voltage ??
And are there any signal propagation effects that aren't explained by voltage changes ??
It sounds like you just said that all sonic differences are explained by voltage differences ..

And yes, sometimes it's difficult to tell if there is a change, but other times the difference is as clear as the triangular bell in the piece that you're listening to .. improvements in clarity are usually really obvious.

 

[DaveVoorhis]

Does EMI or RFI change the voltage ??
And are there any signal propagation effects that aren't explained by voltage changes ??
It sounds like you just said that all sonic differences are explained by voltage differences ..

All sonic differences up to the speaker cones are explained by voltage differences. An electrical waveform is nothing more or less than voltage changes over time. Electrical energy, like that transmitted using a pair of wires to move the cones in your speakers, is a waveform. Thus, sonic differences up to the speaker cones are nothing more or less than voltage changes over time.

Though that waveform is influenced by speaker impedance; speaker cable resistance, inductance, and capacitance; the crossover networks in the speaker; the amplifier; essentially every electrical device between the source and the speaker cones, but ultimately it's expressed entirely as voltage changes over time.

From the speaker cones to your ears, sonic differences are explained not only by the movement of the speaker cones in response to the electrical waveform that drives them, but also room echoes, room shape, the sound transmissivity of the air, the cone material, the flexibility and elasticity of the drivers' surrounds and spiders, the speaker cabinet, the shape of your head and ears (which is called a head transfer function), you sitting position relative to the speakers, etc.

Yes, EMI and RFI change the voltage.

 

[Akustic]

All sonic differences up to the speaker cones are explained by voltage differences. An electrical waveform is nothing more or less than voltage changes over time. Electrical energy, like that transmitted using a pair of wires to move the cones in your speakers, is a waveform. Thus, sonic differences up to the speaker cones are nothing more or less than voltage changes over time.

Though that waveform is influenced by speaker impedance; speaker cable resistance, inductance, and capacitance; the crossover networks in the speaker; the amplifier; essentially every electrical device between the source and the speaker cones, but ultimately it's expressed entirely as voltage changes over time.

From the speaker cones to your ears, sonic differences are explained not only by the movement of the speaker cones in response to the electrical waveform that drives them, but also room echoes, room shape, the sound transmissivity of the air, the cone material, the flexibility and elasticity of the drivers' surrounds and spiders, the speaker cabinet, the shape of your head and ears (which is called a head transfer function), you sitting position relative to the speakers, etc.

Yes, EMI and RFI change the voltage.

Depending on the terms like change (do you mean wave form change on a scope, or a measurable increase or decrease in potential) ...I think that I might agree
Gone technical .. I need to brush up my physics .. I understand it as electron transport .. but there's a duality in there ..
and we may get to splitting hairs, and defining terms here ..
I appreciate your abilities but I'm naturally skeptical .. though I'm always up for a learning opportunity..
I know what I hear ..
Certainly a simple phase reversal changes what I hear but it doesn't increase or decrease the voltage in any measurable way ..
I'll study .. don't want to drag this too far off topic.. ya get me thinking

 

[DaveVoorhis]

Depending on the terms like change (do you mean wave form change on a scope, or a measurable increase or decrease in potential)

They're the same thing. A 'scope simply provides a means to visualise it.

Certainly a simple phase reversal changes what I hear but it doesn't increase or decrease the voltage in any measurable way ..

A 'phase reversal' in an electrical signal by definition means you have changed a voltage (relative to some reference) at a particular point in time (which is equivalent to shifting the waveform by some amount of time.)

 

[Akustic]

They're the same thing. A 'scope simply provides a means to visualise it.

A 'phase reversal' in an electrical signal by definition means you have changed a voltage (relative to some reference) at a particular point in time (which is equivalent to shifting the waveform by some amount of time.)

My dang ears are good at detecting time changes too !!
And they're also hearing what you're saying if you visualize the flow as a wave ..
But an electron transport model makes it easier to understand the influences of things like EMI, RFI, and skin effects, etc .. those influences that disturb that flow ..and the timing of the impulse that you're referring to ..

 

[DaveVoorhis]

My dang ears are good at detecting time changes too !!
And they're also hearing what you're saying if you visualize the flow as a wave ..
But an electron transport model makes it easier to understand the influences of things like EMI, RFI, and skin effects, etc .. those influences that disturb that flow ..and the timing of the impulse that you're referring to ..

An electron transport model may seem intuitive, but it isn't accurate. It's like describing waves on the ocean as being a water transport model, when in fact both water in the ocean and electrons in a wire move relatively slowly, and aren't really being transported. It's the waves that matter, not the medium in which the waves occur.

 

[Akustic]

An electron transport model may seem intuitive, but it isn't accurate. It's like describing waves on the ocean as being a water transport model, when in fact both water in the ocean and electrons in a wire move relatively slowly, and aren't really being transported. It's the waves that matter, not the medium in which the waves occur.

Perspective ..
Particle physics, and wave theory .. Albert messed everybody up when he offered proofs that it was both ..