lorne
Sonic Lizard
tentoze wrote:
All things apparently NOT being equal, I strongly recommend a single strand, solid copper wire at 18 gauge or thicker — but not a lot thicker. OK, — if it were 20 gauge at the right price I'd go for it and see ... er ... hear.
All that BS being said, and after years of trying to go solid strand, I gotta say that these days I am using the fine-stranded van den Hull CS-122 I bought a decade ago. Sounds great to me. But it is not cheap zip either — and so what? Start dirt cheap and work from there. BTW — the most discernibly awful cable I ever heard on my gear was a DIY thing I worked my arse off to construct.
My philosophy regarding cable is consistent whether it be IC, earphone or speaker wire. Try it and see. And, try cheap and work up — not very 'up' if you are on my budget. Yeah, and I HAVE tried simple, cheap DIY against more expensive, factory offerings. It's a mixed bag, but it's just like buying wine. You may buy an expensive wine, and it may not be very different from the the plonk you usually buy or make; you are disapointed. You buy a cheaper one, and if it tastes great and makes the meal you are thrilled to pieces.
Construction, shielding (or no) and insulation/covering/sheathing can make a difference. As to whether the factors involved make a beneficial difference to your total sound-product is an open question. There are theoretical guidelines that are apparently based on scientific measurement and principals. And it all has to do with materials and how they affect the variables in Ohms Law — for example, capacitance. My personal opinion is that no one can predict exactly how all these permutations may combine with your specific system to produce the most pleasant results. The best opinions written in this regard would seem to point to the more obvious things to avoid as opposed to outright specifications — and again these are expressed in terms of Ohms Law.
I'll leave to you to sort out the grain from the chaff — or to someone else who may want to go further. The best advice I have is buried in my archives, but it is out there and easy obtained.
Do not be swayed by snake-oil and anecdotal exhortations. They often lead to spending a lot of money in pursuit of something that is at best a false promise, and at worst a chimera. My bottom line opinion is that more is gained from investing in more excellent engineering of components than throwing huge sums at strands of copper wire. To some this is blasphemy.
I'm in there somewhere if by experimentation we mean —measurement—. And by the scientific method we DO mean it. Nevertheless, I think I DO hear a difference. But, for the most part I am not convinced that one wire/cable is actually better than another in an obvious way — just different. I mean DIFFERENT, but not better. But then it could be because on one cable I was drinking a Bordeaux claret, and with the other blah blah I was enjoying a vino roso from d'Abruzzi — both plonk on my budget!
All things apparently NOT being equal, I strongly recommend a single strand, solid copper wire at 18 gauge or thicker — but not a lot thicker. OK, — if it were 20 gauge at the right price I'd go for it and see ... er ... hear.
All that BS being said, and after years of trying to go solid strand, I gotta say that these days I am using the fine-stranded van den Hull CS-122 I bought a decade ago. Sounds great to me. But it is not cheap zip either — and so what? Start dirt cheap and work from there. BTW — the most discernibly awful cable I ever heard on my gear was a DIY thing I worked my arse off to construct.
My philosophy regarding cable is consistent whether it be IC, earphone or speaker wire. Try it and see. And, try cheap and work up — not very 'up' if you are on my budget. Yeah, and I HAVE tried simple, cheap DIY against more expensive, factory offerings. It's a mixed bag, but it's just like buying wine. You may buy an expensive wine, and it may not be very different from the the plonk you usually buy or make; you are disapointed. You buy a cheaper one, and if it tastes great and makes the meal you are thrilled to pieces.
Construction, shielding (or no) and insulation/covering/sheathing can make a difference. As to whether the factors involved make a beneficial difference to your total sound-product is an open question. There are theoretical guidelines that are apparently based on scientific measurement and principals. And it all has to do with materials and how they affect the variables in Ohms Law — for example, capacitance. My personal opinion is that no one can predict exactly how all these permutations may combine with your specific system to produce the most pleasant results. The best opinions written in this regard would seem to point to the more obvious things to avoid as opposed to outright specifications — and again these are expressed in terms of Ohms Law.
I'll leave to you to sort out the grain from the chaff — or to someone else who may want to go further. The best advice I have is buried in my archives, but it is out there and easy obtained.
Do not be swayed by snake-oil and anecdotal exhortations. They often lead to spending a lot of money in pursuit of something that is at best a false promise, and at worst a chimera. My bottom line opinion is that more is gained from investing in more excellent engineering of components than throwing huge sums at strands of copper wire. To some this is blasphemy.
If we find some nice 20 guage wire, I don't think that we should freak out and pass it by because it is thinner than the usual recommendation for 18 guage or thicker. It depends on the length of the run, doesn't it? My Tannoys came with some quite thin wire hardwired right onto the X-over board, albeit through the gain/energy pots. This may not be in accordance with our current popular thinking, but for a modest run I epect that it was a considered engineering decision based on the requirments. (BTW the wire and X-overs have since been changed about during mods and tweaks.) I have experimented with ultra thin speaker wire and later went back to more usual guages. It all depends on what you hear and what you want to hear — and that in turn is commensurate with your components. Just my opinion, but I would not want to put out giant bucks on a crap shoot like that.
