What Cable Gauge Do I Need for my Speakers?

[Jor4President]

I think that 'shielding' was a typo. It's insulation or maybe dielectric or sheath.

It wasn't a typo just bad translation to english. I meant the insulation. tnx.

NM Wire with shielding? That's a new one on me.... do you have a link?
Not to be pedantic; Romex is a brand name. To be clear solid core doesn't only come as NM wire, it's also comes in THHN, MC.

You are being pedantic. To me it's known as really thick copper wire that's a b... to work with but I've seen many people refer to it as Romex. So at some point I figured Romex was a lot faster to type.

Oh and I think these cables might have shielding but if not... they definitly have everything else.

 

[j_garcia]

It wasn't a typo just bad translation to english. I meant the insulation. tnx.

ALL speaker wire has sheathing between the two wires Otherwise you basically have one wire...

Oh and I think these cables might have shielding but if not... they definitly have everything else. [/QUOTE]

Not sure what the point of that is. A joke I presume?

Both increase resistance. Technically spades are better but banana plugs make your life much easier. If you're going to do the work to connect a spade you might as well use unterminated wire.

Spades are better how exactly? They both increase resistance so slightly that you would never hear the difference or likely be able to measure it. There is zero benefit to spades vs pins vs BFA vs bananas; they all do the same thing. So whichever floats one's boat and works best in your system is the one to go with. Note too that a few manufacturers design their amps specifically so that spades cannot be used due to the proximity of the posts to prevent shorting.

 

[DannyA]

As usual I find this information very interesting and useful. Right now I have 14 AWG with Banana connectors. The cables are from 20 to 50 feet in length. They are much longer than I need because I'm working on speaker/sub positioning. Once I have that nailed down I will run exact length cables. I didn't want to spend too much on cable until I was sure of the lengths. The cable I bought does not indicate a CL rating so I wasn't sure of the quality. Should I expect there to be an advertised CL rating if it is truly quality cable? The same applies for banana connectors.
For example Blue Jeans Cable has CL rated 10 AWG for .99 ft and locking banana connectors for 5.25 a pair. I bought my 14 AWG from Seismic Audio @ $22.99 for 100 ft.
14 Gauge Speaker wire on a spool - 100 Feet - Connect you're AV receiver to your speakers or amplifier
Seismic Audio has banana connectors @ 34.94 for 20 pack.
Banana Connector | Banana Clip | 20 Pack | 10 Red and 10 Black

I'm kind of looking for a sanity check here. Blue Jeans Cable has a very good reputation so I don't doubt the quality of their products. The Seismic Audio cable looks like normal with no apparent visual defects. I don't have any other cable to compare it too but the speakers sound good. With that said, I may not know what I am missing. The other thing is the "welded" connectors that Blue Jeans offers. I hear what they are saying but is it really overkill and maybe a bit of hype or should I really consider getting custom cables with welded connectors? One thing for sure. I will be using 10 AWG when I do the final cabling.

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[Rickster71]

As usual I find this information very interesting and useful. Right now I have 14 AWG with Banana connectors. The cables are from 20 to 50 feet in length. They are much longer than I need because I'm working on speaker/sub positioning. Once I have that nailed down I will run exact length cables. I didn't want to spend too much on cable until I was sure of the lengths. The cable I bought does not indicate a CL rating so I wasn't sure of the quality. Should I expect there to be an advertised CL rating if it is truly quality cable? The same applies for banana connectors.
For example Blue Jeans Cable has CL rated 10 AWG for .99 ft and locking banana connectors for 5.25 a pair. I bought my 14 AWG from Seismic Audio @ $22.99 for 100 ft.
14 Gauge Speaker wire on a spool - 100 Feet - Connect you're AV receiver to your speakers or amplifier
Seismic Audio has banana connectors @ 34.94 for 20 pack.
Banana Connector | Banana Clip | 20 Pack | 10 Red and 10 Black

I'm kind of looking for a sanity check here. Blue Jeans Cable has a very good reputation so I don't doubt the quality of their products. The Seismic Audio cable looks like normal with no apparent visual defects. I don't have any other cable to compare it too but the speakers sound good. With that said, I may not know what I am missing. The other thing is the "welded" connectors that Blue Jeans offers. I hear what they are saying but is it really overkill and maybe a bit of hype or should I really consider getting custom cables with welded connectors? One thing for sure. I will be using 10 AWG when I do the final cabling.

Part of the problem is in comparing those two wires types, It's one of apples to oranges. Their insulation is completly different.

If you are running the wires inside a wall, the wire's insulation needs to be at least CL-2 rated.
If the wire is in-wall and running through a stud cavity that's also being used an a plenum, look for CL2P or CL3.
Hope this helps a bit.

 

[ChuckR]

Comparability with vintage audio

I have what is probably a novice question, but will the speaker wire you recommend here work with a Marantz 2216 receiver?

Thanks,
Chuck

 

[markw]

I have what is probably a novice question, but will the speaker wire you recommend here work with a Marantz 2216 receiver?

Thanks,
Chuck

Why would you think it wouldn't?

 

[haraldo]

and, Heaven forbid, you ever use the word "niggardly" in an uneducated crowd.

It's kinda frightening to realize that wikipedia is the main source of education for many today.

That's kind of like looking to McDonalds for all your nutritional needs.

Fantastic post

 

[A. MacDonald]

Very interesting and informative video.
I have a home studio where I mix and master audio, so my speaker distance is no really an issue. I've had the same monitors for over ten years (JBL 4408a) that are powered by a SoundTech PL150. I am using 12 gauge speaker wire to connect. I apologize if you answered this question in the documentation as I only did a cursory read; mainly watched the video.
So my question: Does the length of each cable matter going to each speaker. The power amp is not in the center, but closer to one speaker, so I cut the cable shorter to avoid mess. It's about half as long. The long is about 15 feet.
Should I cut them the same length?
Albert
Toronto, ON

 

[Steve81]

So my question: Does the length of each cable matter going to each speaker. The power amp is not in the center, but closer to one speaker, so I cut the cable shorter to avoid mess. It's about half as long. The long is about 15 feet.
Should I cut them the same length?

Short answer: Nothing to worry about.
Long answer: http://www.audioholics.com/audio-video-cables/speaker-cable-length-differences-do-they-matter

 

[A. MacDonald]

Wow! That was a fast answer.
Thanks. You guys are great.

 

[felipe]

Given the equipment used...let's say a low-to-mid priced AVR (Sony) and high efficiency (Klipsch) speakers, would there be a difference (audibly) in using 16 AWG to a 10 AWG for a less than 10ft runs?
I know the resistance will be more with the 16awg, but will the difference matter in this instance?
I ask b/c my uncle is building his HT setup which consists of separate amps/pre-amp and low-impedance speakers..which to me 10-12 AWG speaker cabling would be necessary.
As a favor to him, I was going to give him my BJ Ten cables since the runs are the same length as mine..hence the question above. What y'all think??

 

[markw]

Given the equipment used...let's say a low-to-mid priced AVR (Sony) and high efficiency (Klipsch) speakers, would there be a difference (audibly) in using 16 AWG to a 10 AWG for a less than 10ft runs?
I know the resistance will be more with the 16awg, but will the difference matter in this instance?
I ask b/c my uncle is building his HT setup which consists of separate amps/pre-amp and low-impedance speakers..which to me 10-12 AWG speaker cabling would be necessary.
As a favor to him, I was going to give him my BJ Ten cables since the runs are the same length as mine..hence the question above. What y'all think??

So, I take it that after six pages and 110 posts, and I certainly hope you read at least some of them, you still haven't picked up on what's being thrown down?

 

[mtrycrafts]

..., would there be a difference (audibly) in using 16 AWG to a 10 AWG for a less than 10ft runs?
...

No, 16 ga will do fine.

 

[felipe]

Luckily, while I was doing some cleaning I found a spool of 12 gauge unused. Looks to be of good quality...and I honestly don't remember purchasing this lol. So forgetful I'm getting .

 

[LordlySeal]

I'm a bit of a newb here and I read through the whole thread. I recently moved into a house and am running cabling for my surround sound in my living room. In order to avoid putting extra holes in the wall and having to fish cable, I've installed some pvc crown molding to run my cabling through. Pretty much all of the technical stuff goes well over my head, and I just had a few questions for clarification.

1. 12awg wire should be fine for a 50ft run w/6ohm speakers right?

2. From what I understand, using different gauge wire in the same system doesn't make much of a difference. So if I ran 50ft 12awg for my rear speakers, and had say 5-10ft 16awg for the front speakers, it wouldn't be a big deal would it? I only ask because I have all the cabling from the previous installation and I'd like to keep my costs down and just get a 100ft spool for the rear speakers

3. I've seen on here people using Monoprice and Mediabridge cables, any big difference in quality or are they both pretty good?

Any help is much appreciated.

 

[markw]

1) Yes

2) Correct

3) Both are more than adequate.

 

[Noldir]

Question, what would the max distance be for 15AWG? This is the max my amp will accept as gauge and my calculations are often horrible wrong (I get 27.5 feet which is too high think).

 

[rojo]

Question, what would the max distance be for 15AWG? This is the max my amp will accept as gauge and my calculations are often horrible wrong (I get 27.5 feet which is too high think).

What's the impedance of your speakers? Any chance of running banana plugs? If your amp uses spring terminals, you could use pin connectors.

 

[Noldir]

For now: 8 ohm. I did forget to mention that, sorry.

Wouldn't a pin connector be a bottleneck for larger gauges?

What I'm trying to do is build a streaming amp based on an iqAudio DigiAmp, which accepts 1.6 mm cable max, hence the 15awg. My reasoning is that even if I put in a short bit of smaller sized awg (15 awg in this case) running anything larger then that after it won't help with longer runs because the "weakest link" is 15 awg and is the overall limiter to the system.

Of course, I could also have it completely wrong

 

[Speedskater]

Wouldn't a pin connector be a bottleneck for larger gauges?

No, it's length times cross-section area. So you can use a pig-tail of smaller wire to attach the larger wire.