Every now and then I forget just how much information we take for granted that we all have learned over the years.
@Kingnoob is a reminder of just how far I've come over the years. I didn't have the benefits (or challenges) of the Internet to show off my ignorance all those years ago, but I could easily see myself asking many of these same questions that we all consider pretty trollish.
Hey, I get it, and I will do my best to provide a reasonable answer:
@Kingnoob -
We have talked about the thickness of the wires being rated in American Wire Gauge (AWG, or just 'gauge'). The lower the number the thicker the wire. Sure, I think you are on board with that. But, wires still come in TONS of different forms and factors. Network cabling is often referred to as cat-5 or cat-6 cabling, but it actually consists of eight, 24 or 23 gauge wires inside a single jacket. Electrical wire in homes is most often called Romex. It is typically 14 gauge or 12 gauge wire. It is often 3 wires or 4 wires using solid conductors.
Hopefully you know the difference between solid conductors and stranded conductors. If not, please Google it for information.
Each wire in a cable is individually covered in a plastic coating. For category cabling (cat-5/cat-6), they are color coded with orange, orange/white, green, green/white, brown, brown/white, blue, and blue/white.
Electrical cabling for homes has each wire coated with colored plastic as well. Black and white with a uncoated (or brown paper wrapped), or green coated wire is in there for hot, neutral, and ground. When there are 4 total wires inside the Romex, that 4th wire is typically wrapped in red plastic.
Now ALL of these are good examples because they also include an outer jacket (what you call a cover). This is not a cover, but is called a jacket to encase all the wires together into a single 'cable'. The jacket of category (cat-5/cat-6) can be in a ton of different colors. I often buy in different colors so that when I pull multiple cables to one location I can tell them apart by the color quite easily. For electrical cable, white Romex indicates that the wires are 14 gauge and it is rated for 15 amps of power. Yellow indicates it is 12 gauge wires and that it is rated for 20 amps of power.
Cable, when sold, often has markings on the box or the cable's jacket, which has information about the composition of the cable. Cat-5e cable often says 24AWG 4PR to indicate that the wires are 24 gauge and that there are 4 pairs. It will typically also say cat5e right on the jacket so you know it is not cat6 or something else. It may also indicate the fire approval ratings it has. Most are in-wall rated.
Romex is sold (strangely) as 14/2 or 14/3, which indicates that it has 3 or 4 conductors respectively, and will be 14 gauge. 12/2 and 12/3 is the same, but 12 gauge wires.
Speaker wires are typically stranded wires. Since a speaker needs at least two wires (a positive and a negative), you will find speaker cable sold in at least 2 wire varieties. But, some speakers offer four connections, so there is also 4 wire versions. The wire gauge is listed first, then the number of wires (or conductors) is listed second. So, 14/2 cable is 14 gauge, with 2 conductors. 12/2 is 12 gauge with 2 conductors.
All of what you are asking about comes down to this though: Cheap speaker wire is not designed to be run inside of a wall. To be legally allowed to be run inside of a wall, speaker wire must be encased in a fire retardant jacket. Most often this jacket is white with speaker cables, but it can come in different colors. So, when you get a in-wall rated speaker cable, it will come inside a white jacket (most often), but is sold as 14/2 or 14/4 or 12/2 or 12/4 or something similar.
Often in-wall rated speaker cable is sold as 'bulk' cable in a box at long lengths of 250 or more feet. So a third number may be added to the simple description to indicate length. 12/4/500 is 12 gauge, 4 conductor, 500 feet in a box.
So, when you are talking about speaker cable, you are talking about this:
Monoprice Select Speaker Wire features a durable plastic jacket with a color coded conductor to distinguish polarity. The high strand count 16 AWG conductors will easily route though entertainment cen
www.monoprice.com
What most people often get is cable that is sold inside a jacket, like this:
Get the most out of your home audio system with high quality, pure bare copper speaker wire from Monoprice™!Pure Bare Copper is a superior conductor to the copper clad aluminum (CCA) conductors
www.monoprice.com
The price difference isn't that much, and the addition of the jacket often helps make the cable look a bit nicer.
For me, I run all my cable in-wall, so I need the in-wall (CL2) rating that this stuff has.
Be aware that the jacket may provide more or less protection for the wires inside.
CMP rated cable:
https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=13716
This is rated to be run inside of air handling spaces, called plenum, inside of many office buildings. It has a higher level of fire retardation.
Direct burial cable:
https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=21545
Has a jacket which resists UV and water penetration to allow the cable to be buried right in the ground without being run inside of conduit.
Hopefully that covers most of what you may want to know, at this time, about what you are calling a 'cable cover', and that you now know that this is the jacket which is actually put onto some varieties of cables when they are sold from day one.
