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Topic: Biwiring and Cables (Read 16578 times) previous topic - next topic
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Biwiring and Cables

I want to buy decent cables for my speakers and was wondering on how the setup should be.

The speakers in question (Infinity Alpha 40) is biwirable. My amp has two pairs of speaker outputs. In this case which one is a better idea: to use biwiring cables or use separate wires using both of the speaker outputs on my amp? If I use separate identical cables, does the length make difference?

And about the cable diameter, are the thick ones necessarily better? If so how much? I am planning to spend around $80 for my cabling. 7 feet cable for each channel is sufficient. Do you have any suggestions on quality but cheap cables? What do you think about the ones here?

Please let me know what you think. Your help is much appreciated.
The object of mankind lies in its highest individuals.
One must have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #1
http://home.earthlink.net/~rogerr7/wire.htm

I can't vouch for the validity of the information in the above report, but I think it's pretty impressive.  Spending more doesn't necessarily equal greater audio quality, and the things you should really be paying attention to isn't what the marketing hype is always about.  This isn't to say that "any old wire will do", but if you know what you're dealing with, you can look past the hype and buy something (that is much less expensive) that is very appropriate for your situation.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #2
Hi Atici, you have to be careful about articles like the one in the above link.  Its very similiar to sites like www.pcabx.com that use test equipment instead of ears to measure audio equipment.

The article above starts off, and never strays away from judging speaker cable by its measured resistance, which has absolutely nothing to do with its fidelity.  The resistance of any speaker cable would be negligable relative to the audio circuit, unless, of course, you did something exceptionaly mismatched, like using 24 gauge intercom wire to hook up a 200 watt/ch system.

The difference between zip cord and "good" speaker cables comes from a phenomenon known as the "skin effect".  Audio frequencys travel through the skin, or outside edge of a wire.  So, good wires are made up of many small wires, braided in such a way as to maximize phase-coherency that might be smeared by inductive interaction in larger wires.

I can't really do the subject justice here, but if you put "skin effect" into your favorite search engine, you'll get many hits on the subject.  Keep in mind however, that even this is still arguable as "the" reason one cable sounds better than another.  I simply know that some do by virtue of having been in a position to hear the differences.  You also must keep in mind, the difference will only be noticeable on a system that is of sufficient quality to make a difference.  It isn't going to matter much what speaker wire you use if your playing a Pioneer reciever through JBL's.

But, to get back to your original question,  if you can, try your setup both ways, and see if you can tell a difference.  If you can't, it doesn't matter. If you can, go with the setup that sounds best to you.  Always trust your ears.   

Dex

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #3
"Audiophile grade" copper cable is bunk.  Dex4now seems to have missed the statement that ears were used in the blind listening tests performed by Gordon Gow.  McIntosh imanufactures high grade equipment and one would think would have a vested interest in convincing consumers to wire things up with the highest grade of components available.  Instead their engineers write articles describing how speaker cable makes no difference as long as you use an adequate gauge for the distance you're running. 

wirehttp://wiring.svconline.com/ar/avinstall_designer_cables_critical/index.htm includes some data collected by John Dunlavy's labs where "golden-eared" listeners were invited in to listen to cable differences but instead listened to the same 16-guage zip cord the entire time.  Afterwards they described the "incredibly huge" differences they noted between the pricey esoteric audiophile cables they never heard and the "inferior" zip-cord they listened to.  Sounds like conclusive evidence that high-priced cables are worth the money to me.

I personally own a set of Synergystic Research Alpha speaker cables that I paid $6/foot for.  It's a silver/copper mix which I'm now convinced does nothing more than insignificantly reduce the resistance of the cable since it's already 14 gauge wire.  My speaker cabling costs as much as my main speakers and if I'd saved the money from cables I could have easily purchased a better pair of main speakers; something that does make a more audible difference.

My advice, save the money, bi-wire if you want with a heavier gauge (16AWG seems to be good enough for everything) speaker cable that's flexible and makes it easy to identify your positive and negative side so you don't have phasse issues.

For bi-wiring, use cables of the same length and unless your amp has outputs designed for bi-wiring (not an A/B selector section) don't worry about it.  The sales guy at the store where I bought my B&W speakers informed me that simply stripping more insulation back and running the cable through both sets of binding posts is a good idea since you use the same cable as a connection rather than the connection plates usually included with the speakers so you have the same conductive properties across the portions of the crossover circuit.  Whether or not that's true I don't know.  However, it cost me nothing but three inches of stripped back insulation so why not do it?

If I had to do it again I'd spend more on my speakers and keep the 12 gauge speaker cable I got from the leftovers of a pro-audio install done at my church rather than shelling out massive amounts of money for speaker cable that looks pretty but sounds as good as what I had.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #4
Is thicker cable necessarily better? I got a 10 gauge speaker cable (2 pairs for each speaker for bi-wiring using the Speaker A/B outputs of my Amp) from http://www.knukonceptz.com it was $1.10/foot which I think is quite okay. I stripped the wire and attached gold banana plugs and used electric tape to cover them (ugh, don't they look unprofessional!).  Although it looks like my high school electric experiments I think it'll work ok (I don't have the speakers yet  ), but do you think how the banana plugs are attached to the cable makes a big difference? Do you think I should shell out lots of money for Monster ones that claims that it's very easy to attach and provides closer contact?

The cable stands are individually tinned by the way, they claim it helps reduce the skin effect.
The object of mankind lies in its highest individuals.
One must have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #5
Doesn't Ohm's Law cover all of this?

Buy the cheapest stuff that sounds good.  Unless you want to look good by spending money conspicuously.
Nov schmoz kapop.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #6
Even biwiring is vodoo audio. From an electrical point of view, there's no reason why biwiring should be better.

As to if thicker cables are better, they are, up to a thickness. I mean, once you use a big gauge enough, there's no point in going thicker. Reputed people consider 12 gauge enough for all means.

As to skin effect, its effect is negligible at audio frequencies given that you choose an adequate gauge, as explained.

Edit: gdougherty, nice link, it rebutes most misconceptions about cables.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #7
Quote
I personally own a set of Synergystic Research Alpha speaker cables that I paid $6/foot for. . . My speaker cabling costs as much as my main speakers and if I'd saved the money from cables I could have easily purchased a better pair of main speakers; something that does make a more audible difference.

Hi gdougherty, you couldn't have reinforced my point better than this.  Your $6/ft. wire cost more than your speakers!  Lets see, if you have 20 ft./ spkr that means you have about $240 tied up in the set.  And you expected to hear a difference??? 

The system I listened on were closer to $20,000, with an equally expensive Krell, then a Classe' amp.  And it was done in a home with material I was familiar with.  I did read the part about the listening "tests" and it didn't sound like the author had the time to really listen with either material or equipment that he was familiar with.

Besides, the article lost all credibility when it used Stereo Review as its "technical" source.  Go back through their back issues as far as you want. They've never said anything bad about anything.  Thats because they're an advertising source, NOT a serious magazine. Why didn't the author reference more reputable magazines like The Absolute Sound?

Look, I'm not here to sell speaker wire, and I myself don't use "esoteric" wire, simply because my system doesn't warrant it.  But the right wire, in the right system can make a difference. But ONLY if the rest of the system is up to snuff.  And, the evaluation of audio is NOT an area that lends itself to conventional scientific principles.  Its NOT scientific.  If someone thinks their system sounds better with pink wires over green then it does.

My ultimate advice to atici was to listen yourself . . . if you hear a difference then decide on that criteria alone whether you think its all "worth" it.

Dex

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #8
Quote
And, the evaluation of audio is NOT an area that lends itself to conventional scientific principles.  Its NOT scientific.

Why not? Both sound and hearing are physical phenomena, even interpretation of what you hear or feelings can be subjected to a scientifical approach, by means of blind tests. Properties of audio equipment can be evaluated scientifically, there's no magic in them.

Quote
  If someone thinks their system sounds better with pink wires over green then it does.


To him, you must add. There's no reason why this should be true for any other person. And if it sounds better to him is due to other reasons different to the actual sound that is reaching his ears.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #9
Quote
And, the evaluation of audio is NOT an area that lends itself to conventional scientific principles.

Wrong.

This notion can be proven wrong by simply taking a look at a few key scientific fields that have direct ties to audio in some form or another, and their level of technological advancement and continued progression through scientific principles.  These fields range from DSP (audio compression, all sorts of audio manipulation for recording/playback, communications, etc), audio engineering (acoustics, speaker/equipment design, modeling, analysis, etc), advanced physics (theoretical/R&D work, breakthrough technologies, etc), to even fields like psychophysics (psychoacoustics).  If it were not for the ability to scientifically model, evaluate, and predict the behavior of audio through scientific principles, many of these things would not exist in the state they do today.

As KikeG pointed out, audio is a physical phenomena.  It has already been well established that physical phenomena can be evaluated and modeled though scientific principles -- if they couldn't be, again, we wouldn't have anywhere near the level of technology we have now (including all our nice audio equipment..).

Saying that the evaluation of audio (which by the way is a rather vague statement indeed) cannot be scientific -- especially without providing any good arguments as to why -- is rather ignorant and incredibly naive, and you won't get very far with that notion on these forums.  You might try rec.audio.opinion though...

Quote
Its NOT scientific.


No, it can be and should be scientific.  Most people just choose to take the pseudoscientific/mystical route because it requires less knowledge and can be manipulated to fit in line what their preconceived notions better.  Translation:  a scientific view of audio equipment performance and analysis doesn't give most people the "warm fuzzies" like pseudoscience does.  It doesn't sell as well either, I mean.. who could sell a $6000 power cord, a green marker, or a 'quantum clip' through being objective?

Quote
If someone thinks their system sounds better with pink wires over green then it does.


No.  This is begging the question.  The difference must be shown to be present outside of one's own personal whims for it to actually exist in reality.

People can think a lot of things but that doesn't necessarily make them so.  I can choose to think I'm a billionare for example, but that doesn't make it true, or make all that money exist.

Yes, the person may feel that they hear a difference (you could perhaps even argue that they do actually perceive a difference through purely psychological factors), but that has no effect on what the person standing next to them hears if the difference does not exist in reality.  If their colored wires happen to make them feel better, or give them a better case of the "warm fuzzies", then that's fine an dandy -- more power to them, but when they start discussing actual performance with another person, this is irrelevant.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #10
I believe that there are some things in the audio world that can be measured scientifically, and some that cannot.

For example, one cannot measure the quality of lossy encodings with scientific methods. Looking at the frequency response of an MP3 will not tell you anything about how good it sounds. It may give you some parameters, but at the end of the day, it can look horrible in the spectrum display and still sound "transparent".

On the other hand, amplifiers, preamps, wires etc CAN be measured scientifically. Why? Because their job is to be REALLY transparent. At least, that is one school of thought. I don't care that my MP3 is throwing out data that I can't hear to begin with. But I DO want my amplifier to output the exact same thing it sees on the input, only bigger.

So for audio equipment, scientific measurements and proof are needed. For other things they might not. And as a closing, wires are a non-issue. It has been beaten to death in the past. Bi-wiring MIGHT provide a quality increase, but only if your amplifier is crappy to begin with. A good amplifier will work across the entire spectrum equaly, at all times. If your amplifier is running out of current when pumping out the bass, and that is hurting the highs, then it is a crap amp and using TWO amplifiers might work. But just wiring one amplifier using four cables is not going to improve anything.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #11
Quote
I believe that there are some things in the audio world that can be measured scientifically, and some that cannot.

For example, one cannot measure the quality of lossy encodings with scientific methods. Looking at the frequency response of an MP3 will not tell you anything about how good it sounds. It may give you some parameters, but at the end of the day, it can look horrible in the spectrum display and still sound "transparent".

Do you think double-blind tests (like ABX) aren't scientific (statistical) methods?
ABX is a proven method of evaluating lossy audio quality.
I've changed only because of myself.
Remember, when you quote me, you're quoting AstralStorm.
(read: this account is dead)

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #12
ABX is a statistical method... it is a scientific process... but the "data" is not scientific... it is very subjective. ABX is a means to isolate the cause from the effect. First of all, it is the person who is under test when using ABX. We all know this, since some people think OGG 0 sounds nice and others cant go below OGG 9 (I am exagerating, I hope). So really, all that the ABX tests are telling you is how good your hearing is when compared to your peers and to the encoder you are listening to.

And that is the way it should be, since lossy encoders are all about exploiting the limits of our senses. MP3 exploits the limits of our ears just like JPG exploits the limits of our vision. All of these are subjective things, because they are all measured with regards to the SUBJECT. They are not scientific measurements, since they vary from subject to subject. The way it is performed with ABX gives it the scientific process, which validates it.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #13
Quote
Bi-wiring MIGHT provide a quality increase, but only if your amplifier is crappy to begin with. A good amplifier will work across the entire spectrum equaly, at all times. If your amplifier is running out of current when pumping out the bass, and that is hurting the highs, then it is a crap amp and using TWO amplifiers might work. But just wiring one amplifier using four cables is not going to improve anything.

AFAIK It is not related to how good your amplifier works in high and low frequency, it is more about how these frequencies interfere on the wire to the speaker. Biwiring reduces this problem because high and low frequencies follow different paths based on Ohm's law (resistance for low and high frequencies are different at high and low connections of the speaker end). Therefore biwiring should always (in theory) increase the quality.
The object of mankind lies in its highest individuals.
One must have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #14
But this difference is not hearable and is hardly measurable in normal setup. (No one ABXed that.)
If anybody could ABX it using correct cables and it would be verified,
then we could state that this is better.

@LoKi128: I think you wouldn't care if your amp cut frequencies not hearable by any man.
(Like it surely does )
I've changed only because of myself.
Remember, when you quote me, you're quoting AstralStorm.
(read: this account is dead)

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #15
Quote
AFAIK It is not related to how good your amplifier works in high and low frequency, it is more about how these frequencies interfere on the wire to the speaker. Biwiring reduces this problem because high and low frequencies follow different paths based on Ohm's law (resistance for low and high frequencies are different at high and low connections of the speaker end). Therefore biwiring should always (in theory) increase the quality.

Lets be careful about the pseudoscientific rationalizations.  When biwiring, you are connecting two sets of wire to the same outputs of your amplifier and then to different posts on your speakers (one for "higher frequencies" and one for "lower frequencies") on the other end. 

Of course this could possibly make a difference in the sound/electrical signals:  you are theoretically reducing resistance between the amp and speaker by doubling the cross sectional area of the conductors (2 wires vs. 1).  However, you are also changing the capacitance and inducance of the circuit as well.  All three elements play a key role in the signal transfer - heck, your passive crossovers in the speakers are made up of resistors, capacitors and inductors too.  So to biwire simply to reduce resistance is to be (blissfully?) ignorant of what the capacitance and inductance are doing.  It would be very difficult (impossible?) to say that biwiring is "always" better than single wiring.  For all we know you are using highly capacitive cables that affect the stability of the amplifier and biwiring may make it worse.  Or maybe the crossover is tuned in a way that happens to work better with single wiring - but that would also be hard to tell given manufacturing tolerances and the huge difference in the RCL (resistance, capacitance and inductance) of "speaker cables."

In any event, you would need to know the electrical paramaters of the speaker, amplifier and the cables to model what affect biwiring might have - everything else is wild speculation and pseudo-science.  The next question is whether the affect would even be audible (have to do ABX test on that) and then the next question is whether the audible difference is "better" or just different.

If you want to reduce resistance, capacitance and inductance you could just try shorter speaker cables - hard to argue that less cable has less affect than more.

If you are looking for better sound you are better off spending time placing your speakers properly in the room and tuning the resonances / nulls of the room's acoustics (if you haven't already).  Remember that room acoustics can cause 20dB frequency response variations routinely, especially at lower frequencies.  Biwiring will not even begin to approach the impact of acoustics in your system - I would be surprised if it made a difference of more than 0.2dB at any frequency.  Moving a speaker 10cm can have a measureable and audible affect in some situations.  Better to invest in an SPL meter and some books on acoustics.

Having said all this, I once biwired my Mirage speakers because it looked really cool.
Was that a 1 or a 0?

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #16
Well, unfortunately, much of the criticism of my comments is due to a poor choice of words on my part. (And I apologize for being lazy.) However, I would have thought that taken in the context of everything else I said, that the phrase " . . . evaluation of audio . . ." would have been understood to mean, "listening to music." I was trying to keep my comments relevant to Atici's original post. My point was, that he, (or she), should simply try both configurations and decide by their own ears which sounded better, a concept I still stick to.

I agree with much of what has been said, but not all, and I'ld like to just make two points.

I imagine that most of you have seen these "audiophile speaker wire" debates before, as I have, and the one aspect of this that I don't get is, why there always seems to be such vehement disagreement as to whether or not the same construction technique that connects a light-bulb to the power company, wouldn't necessarily be ideal for transfering the fragile, phase-coherent, audio signal from amplifier to speaker. I too, of course, am guilty of this. I don't think any of us would argue, that we shouldn't use zip-cord to bring the satellite feed down from the dish, or romex to connect our network together. Gauge considerations aside, different cables are constructed for different purposes. Is it so hard to imagine that a purpose-built cable might make a subtle difference that test equipment simply won't measure?  Can we just dismiss EVERYONE who buys expensive speaker wire as hapless dupes?  Surely some, but not all.

The other point is, that I think there is a mixture, in the above comments, of technical and subjective considerations. Which is, of course, natural given the subject matter. But I think its important that we understand that they are, in fact, two different animals. We can no more scientifically determine what "sounds" best to us, than we can measure what the best wine is. What smears the distinction here is that they CAN be measured together to some extent. A glass of wine with a tablespoon of salt in it could probably be determined to "taste" bad, with the proper chemical analysis. And an amplifier with 25% THD could probably be said to sound "bad" without ever actually hearing it. (Unless you play a guitar through it, but thats a whole 'nother ball of wax.) My point here is, this all this adds up to why "everyone" can comment on the percieved quality of audio equipment. We all know what sounds good to us, or bad. And THAT, makes for some lively debate.

One last thing, I hope I didn't start a "flame" thang here. I realize my ". . . evaluation of audio . . ." comment certainly WAS inflammatory. But I still find this whole "wire" discussion to be interesting and informative.

Cheers all, dex

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #17
Code: [Select]
1) single wire:

preamp->amp->passive crossover built in speaker->appropriate freqs to low/mid/tweeter


2) biwiring/biamping...

                   |->amp for mid/tweeter
preamp->ACTIVE crossover->amp for bass/woofer speaker


Seems that one forgot the active crossover (if only using A/B posts on the back of the amp that is not designer for bi-wiring) to separate the appropriate frequencies for the proper speakers...

Anyway... one would get  fullrange signal on both woofer and mid/tweeter by bypassing the internal passive crossover in the speaker so that person should let us know when the tweeters get fried

 

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #18
Hi lucpes, just so you know, Bi-amping and bi-wiring are not quite the same thing. Bi-amping is as you describe.  Bi-wiring is something that a speaker has to be designed for. The manufacturer will include "straps" on the speaker binding posts that allow the high-pass and low-pass portions of the passive cross-over to be separated.  So one runs separate speaker wire to the hi and lo sections without an
active cross-over.  Sort of a poor-mans bi-amping.  You don't see too many speakers built this way though.  (Or I should say, I haven't.)   

Discussions of the audible advantages of this can be referenced above.   

Dex

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #19
Responding to original question:

It has been my experience that there can be a major difference between speaker cables. Especially really long ones like mine - 5-8 meters from amplifier to speakers.

You can buy very expensive speaker cables. Be aware that some are designed to manipulate the sound. These might sound better depending on the accoustic condition of your listening room and your other audio components. These types of cables are not neccesarily the best.

When buying cables, consider the following points:

* Thickness and length
* Inteference and shielding
* Connections

A thin long cable cannot carry as much power as a thick short one. You need a proper thickness or multiple thin cables in parallel. If you go with my suggestion at the end of this post, simply add another cheap cable and listen/compare.

Interference from power cables can affect sound very much. It is possible worse in USA than EU, because of the 110V/240V difference. Lower voltage = higher power, but don't kill me if I'm wrong. Anyway, keep all your signal and speaker cables away from power cables. Do not roll long cables up or tangle them together. An induction effect can be created and it does not sound good. If it is impossible to keep signal cables away from power cables, use shielded cables. Either shielded power cables or shielded signal cables or both (might not be needed).

Connecting the cables is the last step, where things often go wrong. Good conductors rust - bad conductors do not. Putting golden banana plugs on the cables is generally a bad idea - gold is a bad conductor. But they are very flexible and that matters sometimes. I use them myself, because I don't like spending hours hooking up the cables. The standarrd connectors, where you remove isolation from the cable, put it in and turn a plastic screw takes a long time, but generally connects well. Bear in mind, that you need to snip of the ends and remove more isolation if you take the cables out after a a little time. The exposed ends have rusted and cannot provide a proper connection if reused. Whether to use A+B on the amp for bi-wiring or just A probably depends which way gives you the best connection. It has been my experience that A+B does that.

I have tried several cables over the years. I tested the the cheap ($4/meter) thick cobber cables with hundreds of thin cobber threads inside some 10 years ago. I did not like them, but they were very easy to install. I used some expensive ($30/meter) solid cobber core cables from AudioQuest  for years, but threw them away when I discovered something better: Cat5 twisted pair cables used for computer networks. It must be the installation type with the solid core - not the soft core cables with plugs. This cable is very cheap ($0.30/meter) and it sounds very well in my ears. It is however vitally important to connect it properly (I do not know the details of why it needs to be done). The cable consists of four wire pairs. The four pairs each have two wires - full colour and half colour - twisted around eachother. The four pairs are twisted themselves. You must connect the full colour to one pole and the half colour to another pole. You can in theory biwire your speakers with one of these cable.  Use two pairs for high-range and two pairs for low ranges. But the cable is very thin. I use six cables per speaker - two for upper frequencies and four for lower frequencies. If you connect all 8 wires in a cable to one pole, you are doing it wrong. If you use multiple cables, connect all full coloured wires from all cables to one pole and the rest to the other. This cable is not shielded, so it is very important to keep it away from power cables as written above. 

If you choose this cable, you might want to consider banan plugs. It is hard to remove the teflon isolation from the wires. And it takes some time to do it on the 16 cables I have used for my 5.0 surround...

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #20
I'd like to add a comment:

Audio is a physical phenomena and so is perception of music and the feelings it can invoke. But humans have no idea of how the brain works yet.

If you like to look at your expensive thick blue cables, then there is a chance that your music experience is better than some plain grey cables etc.

I believe it is of vast importance to feel good about the audio components you select, how they look, how they are installed and so on.

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #21
Quote
Connecting the cables is the last step, where things often go wrong. Good conductors rust - bad conductors do not. Putting golden banana plugs on the cables is generally a bad idea - gold is a bad conductor.

Annuka,
I agree with several points in your post, but not this one.

Gold is not a bad conductor - actually it is pretty good.  It is the third best common conductor with silver being the best followed by copper and then gold.  The reason that gold connection surfaces are often used and are generally desireable is that they don't oxidize (or "rust") easily, keeping electrical contacts performing well for a long time even under adverse conditions.  Both silver and copper oxidize relatively quickly making gold an excellent/preferred choice for connectors.  For cost reasons copper is an excellent choice for conductors (the actual wire), with some high-end designs affording silver conductors.

Some data:
Quote
A brief summary of comparative properties of metals suitable for current carrying applications and required features of the connector follows.

Silver, Copper, Gold, Aluminum and Magnesium have comparable properties, for current carrying applications and required features of the connector. The above mentioned pure metals all contain relative electrical conductivity which can be defined by Percentage of Volume Conductivity. Silver has 108.3% Volume Conductivity. Copper contains 100% Volume Conductivity. Gold assumes 73.4% Volume Conductivity. Aluminum has 64.9% Volume Conductivity. Magnesium contains 38.0% Volume Conductivity.
Was that a 1 or a 0?

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #22
Quote
...poor-mans bi-amping.  You don't see too many speakers built this way though.  (Or I should say, I haven't.)   

My point exactly... though biwiring with no crossover may sound better... especially if you have 2-way speakers you can melt ear wax and FEEL the treble...

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #23
Quote
Biwiring reduces this problem because high and low frequencies follow different paths based on Ohm's law (resistance for low and high frequencies are different at high and low connections of the speaker end). Therefore biwiring should always (in theory) increase the quality.

Right...  use thicker cable for bass and thinner for treble? 

[edit]sorry for spamming this thread but at least with the Alpha 40 biwiring without using a proper amp that's built for this would do no good IMHO[/edit]

Biwiring and Cables

Reply #24
Oh man... biwiring is *useless*, has no sense from an electrical/technical point of view. The only thing you do biwiring is double the capacitance and half the resistance. Capacitance is negligible in case of speaker cable. And resistance, well, once you are using a thick enough cable, there's no point in halving it.

About high and low frequencies going through same cable, this is fine, cables are perfect linear devices from an audio point of view, so can carry all frequencies without interfering each other at all.

If anyone can give me an alternative technical explanation of why could it be better, I'll be pleased to read it.