What are THE best speaker cables out there?
- Thread starter Crescent13
- Start date
Be nice.Any piece of copper of sufficient gauge should be more than enough.
Grab some 12 guage home wiring wire and you'll prrobably have your cheapest possible best speaker wire.
Originally posted by: Kenazo
Any piece of copper of sufficient gauge should be more than enough.
Grab some 12 guage home wiring wire and you'll prrobably have your cheapest possible best speaker wire.
Well this isn't for me to buy. I have some great 12 gauge copper cables already hooking my HT up, I'm just wondering what the best out there is not considering cost at all.
I've seen these at a show before, as thick as your arm.
I've heard Kimber can cause instability in amplifiers because of weird construction.
I recommend Sound King wire available at parts express (cheap)
http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/pshowdetl.cfm?&PartNumber=100-155&DID=7
If you are determined to spend a lot, look into Acrotec.
I've heard Kimber can cause instability in amplifiers because of weird construction.
I recommend Sound King wire available at parts express (cheap)
http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/pshowdetl.cfm?&PartNumber=100-155&DID=7
If you are determined to spend a lot, look into Acrotec.
Yeah I saw the kimber ones too at a local audio place. Didn't know they caused instability though. Again I'm not looking to buy new cables, Just curious as to what the best ever are.
Coat hanger wire with electrical tape wrapped for insulation, simply braze the ends together for more length.
Kimber and MIT are pretty much the highest end you can get.....anything from them is going to be about as uncompromising as can be found
99% of you have never done a double blind test to determine what really "sounds" better either.
I have.
With M.I.T. cables, Monster, Kimber, Belden and zip cable.
I use Dayton speaker cable now for install and for my own system and no one has complained. In one case, they actually liked it better than the Monster, but he smokes a lot of weed, so go figure that into the equation.
To me, The M.I.T. were really good, Monster & the Kimbers were good too. Zip cable and the Belden were below the rest.
The hardest thing about speaker cable testing is listener ear fatigue.
But know this, you can't hear what looks good on a measured test.
Most of the issues with these tests are Connection integrity or speaker related.
Doing a double blind test requires several pairs of the same speakers, a speaker bank switcher and it's the contacts of those switches that can introduce "anomolies" that are audible.
Lamp (Zip Cord) will work, but if you can afford a little better, get it. If you think it's better to buy "top of the Line" you are buying bragging rights, FIRST and audio performance second.
To me, Dayton is a good compromise... Made in The US, flexible, small diameter, and good quality materials inside that solders and crimps easily.
I still have some MIT's but I haven't used them in a long time.
I used them in my studio for the Near Field mons. ( Tannoy's )
I have.
With M.I.T. cables, Monster, Kimber, Belden and zip cable.
I use Dayton speaker cable now for install and for my own system and no one has complained. In one case, they actually liked it better than the Monster, but he smokes a lot of weed, so go figure that into the equation.
To me, The M.I.T. were really good, Monster & the Kimbers were good too. Zip cable and the Belden were below the rest.
The hardest thing about speaker cable testing is listener ear fatigue.
But know this, you can't hear what looks good on a measured test.
Most of the issues with these tests are Connection integrity or speaker related.
Doing a double blind test requires several pairs of the same speakers, a speaker bank switcher and it's the contacts of those switches that can introduce "anomolies" that are audible.
Lamp (Zip Cord) will work, but if you can afford a little better, get it. If you think it's better to buy "top of the Line" you are buying bragging rights, FIRST and audio performance second.
To me, Dayton is a good compromise... Made in The US, flexible, small diameter, and good quality materials inside that solders and crimps easily.
I still have some MIT's but I haven't used them in a long time.
I used them in my studio for the Near Field mons. ( Tannoy's )
Oh, I wouldn't know. I don't even come close to having that kind of a setup but I just recall these from readin about them a while back.
I figure if you are paying an insane amount of money for something, after a certain point, a certain amount of quality is assumed. I don't think I'd pay $23500 for speaker cables even if I was a billionaire, but that's just me. And I'd have a hell of a system too.
I imagine having these would primarily serve for bragging rights at the next party at your house.
I once connected the Main Power amp outputs to the first bank of speakers of a PA system in a soccer arena in Puerto Alegre Brazil with Coat hangers. I wire nutted the 1/4 cable to the coat hanger wire and wrapped it all up with electrical tape. It works.
It won't win any beauty contests, but it worked. This was in 1978, and there was a riot during the main acts set (Silver Convention). The camera ,which had pics of the setup) , and some other gear of mine was stolen after the stage was rushed by fans and we had to be hustled out of the arena. But this is the truth and being able to pull a rabbit out of my a$$ like that is one of the reasons I have had such a cool life.
I work for a HT company...we use basic shielded 12 gauge wire on everything from a 2,000 - 100,000 setup. Monster, MIT, etc are all a big waste of $$ in my opinion.
But you've never done a true double blind test either, I'll wager.
Opinion < OBSERVATION.
An HT company, pro sound company, event rental house have different reasons for the goods they choose as opposed to an audio enthusiast or "purist" interested in the highest performance products possiblem and the subsequent bragging rights.
An analogy I use is it's like buying a HUMMER versus a Caravan to go get groceries and the kids to school. Either vehicle will do the job, but some people's reasons for buying either will be vastly different. When "penis size" is at stake, you're buying the Hummer, wether it suits the need or not.
Nice way of putting it.
On the coathanger thing...you used them for speakers, but in Ecuador I once saw the following setup.
Metal roof, concrete floor open-air amphitheatre. Roof slants up to provide tons of space in the middle, but you can touch it at the sides.
Single strand wires run to high-wattage lights strung from the ceiling.
A long piece of clothesline runs to the metal roof, providing the other pole to illuminate the lights.
I don't know whether the roof was the hot or cold pole, but I don't think anyone else did either, so...
Oh please. Don't bring in this whole bs saying how it matters, because I could bet you probably couldn't even realize what you're working with. It's just like people and their Vodkas. I've done double blinds with Belvedere and Grey Goose, and it's a pretty hard call even then...
Ahhh yes, the glories of Edison's Alternating Current.
Given that it only matter when the circuit is energized, And I'll bet that was effected using a knife blade disconnect or Circuit breaker handle.
In Guyaquile, I wired the power distribution directly to the transformer outputs at the modern (for then) circuit breaker panel and used 4 : 250 ft runs of 12/2 w ground Romex as service feeds to 4 double gang metal boxes with duplex Edisons as "distribution".
One 20 amp circuit each for Sound and Stage and the lights got 2 and shared for the backstage.
This for 20K people in a 3/4 circle set up, using 16 "BullFrog" Column speakers and 600 watts for the PA. I used 200 watts for the stage monitors in 4 floor wedges.
I used a Crown VFX 2 electronic crossover to biamp the columns , which by their nature are line arrays. I used a 2 to 1 ratio of LOW to High freq cabinets, crossed them over at 1,000 cycles and shelved the low end at 100 cycles at 12 db / octave. The owner of the system was AMAZED at the SPL I achieved and the coverage was very smooth. Amazed me too, given that the speakers in the cabs were all 10 inch drivers, 8 per cabinet. Imagine a Shure Vocal master (off brand) . In fact the floor wedges were Shure Vocal Masters. I ran the system in MONO and had only 2 monitor mixes. EQ was Biamp 2 x 10 band eqs, using CUT ONLY so as not to clip the inputs of the PEAVEY CS 200 amps.
Nothing tripped, no one got shocked and we got paid.
Game , set and Match!
Oh and I got laid that night too.
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