speaker wires

[Grainger49]

The ONLY real answer is try it yourself, determine if it is worth the money. Maybe borrow some $$$ wire from a friend.

There are some out there that will say that it makes no difference. But you have to hear it to know.

And no one else can say if it is worth it for you.

 

[stuartk]

Those with the adequate gauge for the run and with good connectors at the ends. Mine are second hand PS Audio.

Another extremely important factor is that they must be long enough for the run.

 

[jami w.]

honestly all ive ever used was monster cable the stuff thats straned togther inside of the sheath. its all ill eva use i dont like the thin stuff cuz my cat will chew through it lol but with the wire i run its got a thick sheath like i stated so thats all i trust wit the lil teeth in the house freakin worse than kids!!!!!!

 

[Pilot]

Well, there's a lot of talk but no practical examples. I use 16 AWG zip cord that I bought in Woolco many years ago. It measures around 20pF and 0.0042 ohms per foot, so for a 30ft length (which is what I have) that's 600pF and 0.126 ohms. That's peanuts. Consider the fact that the input coils inside my speakers have 200ft of 16AWG wire on them, and the caps are 47µF, then the cables don't amount to a row of beans by comparison. It's all down to fashion and you can't quantify that. If it makes you feel happy using expensive cables then that's all that counts. Same with the rest of the gear.

Bryan

 

[wineslob]

Tell you what - if you're just curious wait till the SO is out of the house and hang towels or blankets, no kidding.
Listen for reflections, from the wall behind your stereo, sidewalls, things hung on the wall, your chairs, you hear one, stick a blanket/towel on it. Even if you don't, experiment.

AMAZING. Then you'll know how far you want to go (and it doesn't even address bass traps).

Pete

I'm going to try this with acoustical ceiling panels, the 2'X4' ones, for the wall behind me and possibly the adjacent walls to the speakers. This could be a really cheap and very non-invasive (those new removeable hooks anyone?) way for me to mod the room while she-who-must-be-obeyed is out and about. :thmbsp:

 

[wineslob]

Well, there's a lot of talk but no practical examples. I use 16 AWG zip cord that I bought in Woolco many years ago. It measures around 20pF and 0.0042 ohms per foot, so for a 30ft length (which is what I have) that's 600pF and 0.126 ohms. That's peanuts. Consider the fact that the input coils inside my speakers have 200ft of 16AWG wire on them, and the caps are 47µF, then the cables don't amount to a row of beans by comparison. It's all down to fashion and you can't quantify that. If it makes you feel happy using expensive cables then that's all that counts. Same with the rest of the gear.

Bryan

Actually thats fairly high. Magnet wire (Speltz style) is .001 ohms/ft and, I believe, virtually no capacitance.

 

[Pilot]

That sounds like pretty heavy stuff, around 10AWG. And you're bound to get some capacitance if the cables are close. I don't think 0.126 ohms is going to make a lot of difference to 8 ohm speakers.

Bryan

 

[bjarmson]

Bought a 500 foot box of Vampire Wire on eBay 6+ years ago for about $60-70. Think it's 16 gauge, white outer cover over individually wrapped, color coded wires. Sounds great. Will last me for the rest of my life. I get the feeling that those $1000 wires are the province of those with too much money and too little brains.

 

[celticguitar]

Gee I posted the same article a short time ago and got shut down quicker than you can say..... but anyway I read another article that said as long as your resistance of your wire is less 5% ( I believe that number is correct) of your speaker load you should be fine. If you want to see some interesting wires go to Mapleshade for thier take on what makes a great wire. I made some wires out of 6 conductor telphone house wire following resistance formula with a RF drain that sound great but that's my opinion. Also side note I agree who ever said that too much time tweaking can take away from actually listening to the music. You froget what it sounded like before you started playing with it If it sounds good to you Who Cares?:bash:

 

[Pilot]

Speaker cables can make a difference, but not quite the way people think. Many commercial speakers have an impedance curve like a dog's hind leg and then some, with reactance all over the place. You don't have to take my word for it - look at some of the reviews where they take these measurements. And a lot of amps aren't unconditionally stable. If they don't have a zero output impedance at all frequencies, then the speakers become part of the feedback loop. Throw in some exotic cables with high inductance or capacitance or both and you've got an interesting combination.You'll certainly get a different sound in this case. If you hit on the right combo, then it's just good luck. I can use any old piece of wire with my setup. My speakers look pretty much like a pure resistance and my amp (a much modified NAD 2200) is very stable, so there's no point in improving on my hi tech zip cord. After all, I might get 0.1db increase in sound. Wow!

Bryan

 

[ozmoid]

http://www.audioholics.com/reviews/cables/diy-speaker-cable-faceoff

Enjoy.

 

[celticguitar]

AWG Feet/Ohm Ohms/100ft Ampacity* mm^2 Meters/Ohm Ohms/100M

10 490.2 .204 30 2.588 149.5 .669
12 308.7 .324 20 2.053 94.1 1.06
14 193.8 .516 15 1.628 59.1 1.69
16 122.3 .818 10 1.291 37.3 2.68
18 76.8 1.30 5 1.024 23.4 4.27
20 48.1 2.08 3.3 0.812 14.7 6.82
22 30.3 3.30 2.1 0.644 9.24 10.8
24 19.1 5.24 1.3 0.511 5.82 17.2
26 12.0 8.32 0.8 0.405 3.66 27.3
28 7.55 13.2 0.5 0.321 2.30 43.4
Hi all just a table of copper wire resistance to meet the 5% rule and don't forget when hook two wires of the same gauge side by side not series you get a reduction of resistance by two gauges etc. so you see if if you use thin wire of short lengths you meet the rule I believe that's why CAT and other small diameter wires bundled together work so well . I also believe the small diameter solid copper wires with thier individual insulators elimnate some the draw backs of braided stranded wire within one insulator. each setup is looking to perfect some aspect of the component but brings in another imperfection especially when applying different wave forms lengths of differing amplitude. A good test we did in school to measure resistance to certain wave forms in a circut was with a sine wave generator and a ocilloscope measure the energy as it left the generator and what you got at the end it varied greatly with each wave form and size of conductor and structure of conductor solid vs braided, load etc. and that was just one wave from at a time. so you see it can get muddied very quiclky and it's all compromise
but Have fun experiment!