I understand that the calibre of your loudspeaker cable is an important factor in the overall sound quality.
I also understand that OFC (oxygen free copper) cable is a good thing and that it is usually direction marked so you can hook it up correctly - arrows point away from amplifier towards speakers.
Apparently this is due to the way the wire is drawn from the spinning machines.
But, the signal that powers the speaker is DC so one wire (+ve) is the “flow” and the other (-ve) is the “return” for the electrical signal. So you end up with two wires per loudspeaker, both directional and apparently both in the same direction.
I have never seen cables with +ve and -ve in opposite directions as the runs are rarely individual cores, rather two cores in one sheath. Any cables with ends already fitted are invariably dealer constructed and I’m sure they wouldn’t bother to split the cores and fit red/black in opposite directions.
So why do cable makers mark their cables directionally?
First off all, Oxygen-free is basic nonsense. But “direction” is even more patently absurd. The signal to speakers is AC. That is, half the time the electrons flow one way, half the time they flow the other way. Anybody who tells you that you have to hook up speaker wires in the right direction is someone you know for a fact is clueless and/or just in it to make sales.
First off, OFC cables are a nice scam retailers like to use to sell you more expensive cables. I’ve heard hookups with both, and frankly, I can’t tell the diference. Maybe an oscilloscope can.
The reason speaker cables are marked for polarity, is so that you can get both speakers being properly driven in phase. Otherwise sounds from one speaker would tend to cancel out sound from the other.
I would have to agree that the OFC is likely nonsense. ESPECIALLY the part about the “direction of flow of the electrons”. Absolute hogwash.
That being said, there IS something to the expensive interconnect cables, IF you have expensive enough equipment, especially speakers, that allow you to hear things at that kind of detail.
A firend of mine reciently bought some $10K Infinitys driven with a $1200 Harmon Kardon. I’ve heard them myself, and these things are very impressive! They are so detailed, he started noticing “listening fatigue” because of the odd-order harmonics (the harmonics that sound “bad” to our ears) that are common in solid state amps. Long story short, he started getting into tube amps. The tube-amp guy he was dealing with (and who gave him some loaners to try at home, beat that Good Guys!) also gave him a $120 pair of interconnects, AND a similarly priced POWER cable for his amp. When he installed the expensive intercon, he said it was like a veil had been lifted off the music. Installing the power cable lifted another veil off the music giving another level of improved clarity.
So, I’m reasonably convinced that IF you have really high-end equipment, then shelling out for expensive wires is a reasonable thing to do. But if yer just playing your CDs thru your $500 Sony amp and joe-everyone speakers, then the expensive wires are a waste of money because you’ll never hear the difference.
speaker wire is speaker wire. as long as it is properly shielded and of the right gauge, there is NO DIFFERENCE.
You’ll NEVER hear the difference, its all in your head. If need be i’ll install my old hd and get you the link to a McIntosh ENGINEER’s website that says the same thing.
Hey, but Rob V’s friend went for the expensive cables and connectors, and he’s now enjoying his stereo more because of it. So IF you’re one of those people who believes that they will sound better, go for it!
Count me as a sceptical agnostic on the whole expensive cable thing.
I have semi-fancy speaker cable ( fancy for your average schmoe, bargain basement and barely acceptable by hardcore audiophile standards ) - Audioquest Type 4. Plus some similarly “low-end” Audioquest interconnects, all of which I got for a song. Frankly, I can’t tell a scintilla of difference between those and their high-grade, heavy-gauge Radio Shack equivalents and I have both good hearing and reasonably decent system ( retail replacement would probably be ~$6500, excluding rack, stands, and cables - not that I actually paid anything near that myself - I buy mostly used or demo equipment ).
Now, I’m willing to accept the possibility that not everyone who hears the difference is delusional and that in a very transparent system in a very well-prepared listening room, there might be something to it ( even then, I can’t imagine the difference could be more than subtle ). So if you think you can hear a difference and can afford it, then, as Curtc noted, more power to you. But in my limited experience, it verges on a scam ( the markups on the truly high-end cables has to be nothing short of astronomical ).
Yeah, I must admit, I haven’t done the A/B comparison with my buddy’s system myself, but he and I have comparable hearing when it comes to music. So I TEND to take him at his word on his aural experience.
Isn’t it true, though, that different people hear things differently?
That is to say, some people may listen to my friend’s system and go, “yeah that sounds nice”, and other’s may say, “WOW, that is outstanding!” and go on about all the deatail they hear, etc?
QED is correct. Cables are marked for electrical polarity
To elaborate: if you connect a speaker IMproperly (on my system that would be connecting the red post on the amp to the black post on the speaker), the speaker will work just fine. If it’s the only speaker you’re using, you won’t hear any bad effect at all. If you misconnect BOTH stereo speakers you won’t hear anything amiss either. It’s only when you wire the two speakers differently that you will experience deteriorating sound quality. When the same tone is set to both speakers and converted to sound waves, the two waves are propagated with their amplitude exactly the opposite of each other, but the frequency wavelength the same. When the waves intersect, they cancel rather than reinforce each other, resulting in a perceived wavering decrease in volume.
I have experienced this in a lab environment, in a large space where you can walk into cancellation points and hear the sound disappear entirely, to reappear when you move a couple of feet in any direction.
As a 20-year media technician, my advice to you is to forget about pricey cable, unless you have very long cable runs, 75’ or more. Even for long runs, the signal won’t be noticeably better, but pricey cable DOES tend to be better shielded, and might do better in an urban environment where there’s a lot of RF interference.
That’s not entirely true. At the very least, you do want to use a sufficient gauge of wire to handle the current at the higher power levels. If your wire is too thin, not only will it overheat, and possibly present a fire hazard (yes, I have seen speaker wire insulation melt on high-power systems), but may cause enough of an impedance mismatch as to cause noticeable distortion.
No one really seems to have addressed why the cables are marked for direction. I can’t say I’ve seen speaker cables marked for direction, but my guitar cables are marked for direction. Why?
What do you mean? One end is marked “Guitar” and the other says “Amp”? That’s silly, unless the plugs at eat end are physically different. If they’re standard 1/4" guitar patch cords, there’s no reason to plug them in in a specific direction. Electrically, that’s nonsense.
Yep, you’re right. Shielded speaker cable is ridiculous. Even for very long runs, it buys you almost nothing, since any induced signals are well below the power level of even low-volume speaker signal levels (and indeed, below the minimum driving levels for most speakers). I’ve heard hum in speakers, of course, but it’s never come from the speaker wires; it’s always been from the amplifier, either from a bad power supply or hum induced in line-level input cables.
I didn’t catch that bit til long after I’d posted. 