HELP!! Which speaker cable should I buy?

[hootie10]

Hello all,

I need help deciding on a pair of speaker cables for my Energy Veritas 2.2i's. And power via Rotel RA-1070 soon. Right now I'm using cheap Monster Cable that I've had for years.

I think I've got it narrowed down to three. 1) River Cable 2) Cobalt Cable 3) Signal Cable. Now I've read good things about River and Cobalt on this site (I've been learning so much reading all this stuff!). Does anyone have any experience with Signal Cables? They are highly regarded as far as a few reviews off of Audiogon.com.

I would like to limit spending to about $200 for a 9 foot pair. I also would like them to look decent because they will be fairly exposed (not in the wall).

Any suggestions, comments will be GREAT!!

 

[markw]

From reading your post in full, I would imagine thatyou will be happiest with the one that looks best to you. I'd venture to say that the sonic differences between them will be a non-issue.

 

[Mudcat]

Okay, this will be tough, and you'll need your calculator, but here goes.

You need to have the following paramaters for each cable, you amp, and your speakers available.

Frequency = F
Resistance = R
Capacitance (picofarads) = C
inductance (microhenries) = H
Pi = P
Watts = W
Volts = V
Current = I
Looks = L
Cost = S


using the above mentioned symbols for the parameters in question, the equation will be:

1 = (1/2PFC)²*(2PFH)²*(2PFC)²*(1/2PFH)²*(LE/RI)*(W/SEI)


After looking at this for a while, you'll notice that it all cancels out except:

L/S = 1

That should help you make your decision.

 

[Dan Banquer]

Speaker Cable

Try here: http://www.audioholics.com/techtips/setup/interconnects/DIY_speaker_cables.html
If I can teach an investment banker to solder than my guess is that you can teach yourself to strip wire and connect some banana plugs with this article.
Have fun;
d.b.

 

[jaxvon]

Oh, it should also be noted that if you were thinking of buying some River Cable Starflex SPX, it's simply some Canare Star-Quad speaker cable with nice banana plugs and techflex. You can find the cable on Blue Jeans Cable for $1.05 a foot. You can then pick up some TechFlex at Parts Express. For good terminations, head on over to Cobalt Cable for some spiffy locking banana plugs. And lastly, for some heatshrink tubing, check out Parts Express again. This would be everything you need to make your own cables. The best part is, they can be whatever length you want, in whatever color fits your decor (assuming you get techflex)! Also, while you won't get the *BLING BLING* gold stripe on your techflex that River Cable has, you will still get a quality product that looks good. Plus you get the pride of having done it yourself.

 

[Leprkon]

http://www.impactacoustics.com/product.asp?cat_id=3005&sku=29176

or

http://www.impactacoustics.com/product.asp?cat_id=3005&sku=43027

or

the masters series are on closeout from acoustic research at accessories4less.com (gold plated banana plugs and 10 gage wire for less than 30 bucks each speaker in 15 foot lengths

great values.

 

[howie85]

My .02 i would say impact acoustics is a good bargain and using the link from this website gets you a discount also.
http://www.audioholics.com/cedia/cedia2004/impactacoustics.php
happy hunting
Curt

 

[Laserjock]

I too am looking at experimenting with making my own speaker cables, at least for my front three speakers to start.

I have been reading everything from the mind-numbing CAT5 braiding recipe to the more simple methods.

I think I am going to start with the Canare Star Quad 4S11 terminated with bananas. Toss on some carbon Techflex and heatshrink and they should at least look good and probably sound much better than what I am using now.

Just FYI, I was going to purchase the 4S11 at Blue Jean, but found it for less than 70 cents a foot at Markertek....that is a deal!

Any tips or suggestions from the gurus out there is welcome...

 

[hootie10]

Hello all,

Thanks for the input. I think I'm going to try to do my own speaker cables. Seems like it will be the most affordable and I can make it look as good as I want. I have a little break from Med School so its going to be my winter break project.

Thanks again. I'll let you know how things turn out. Maybe I might even post some pics....

 

[mtrycrafts]

Toss on some carbon Techflex and heatshrink and they should at least look good and probably sound much better than what I am using now.

..

That depends. What do you have now? If it is 24 ga, yes, you should hear a difference
But, if you already have about 16ga cables, you will be wasting time unless, DIY is your bag
Hard to beat $.30/ft or less for low voltage landscape wire.

 

[gene]

I wouldn't use 16AWG cables, especially for long runs. It has about 2.5 times the resistance of standard 12AWG and the price difference between the two aren't that significant for the added benefits of low resistance cables especially when dealing with speakers that have low impedance profiles at high frequencies.