What do I need to know about speaker wire

In My Humble Opinion
21

You don’t mention whether you’ll be running any speaker wire in the walls or ceiling, which is common in home theater setups in order to conceal the wiring to the rear/side speakers. If so, you must use wire that is rated CL3. You cannot put ordinary speaker wire or lamp cord inside a wall or ceiling because it violates building code in most areas.

If you’re not running the wire in walls or the ceiling, you may want to look into flat, paintable wire which can easily be concealed alongside baseboards.

Or you can just run it across the floor and duct tape it to the carpet.

22

Gee, Scumpup, is there something you want to share with us?

23

There’s a “Yes, but…” comment to this.

Copper is more conductive than gold but gold is more conductive than copper oxide.

Copper rapidly develops an oxide layer that’s not very conductive. Gold does not oxidize and is therfore a better conductor at the connections.

In practice, for speakers, it makes no difference and copper is a lot cheaper.

FYI: Silver is the best conductor.

From memory, in order:
Silver
Copper
Gold
Aluminum

24

Belrix:

I’m well aware gold is a non-reactive element (for the most part). I was just responding to the statement as-read.

I’d like to add something, however: standard electrical connecters are never pure copper; they’re always plated with nickel or some kind of alloy. Most platings offer excellent corrosion resistance under normal conditions, coming close to (but not equaling) gold.

So is gold plating worth the extra cash? In some instances yes. An example would be connectors used with LRU boxes onboard military aircraft. Are they worth it for home stereo systems? No, in my opinion.