solid core

[Blacksabbath25]

You could have bought yourself some tellurium q black for that cash.

thanks for that i will keep that in mind but the trouble is when buying this cables most of the hifi shops around my way have no demo speaker cables to try first before you buy and plus the fact its a specal order in job from the company that makes it so its a risk if the cable sounds bad and a lot of money to wast if got it wrong *smile*

 

[Vladimir]

You could have bought yourself some tellurium q black for that cash.

Is that one solid core or stranded?

 

[Vladimir]

Did you get the double star-quad geometry?

double star quad but they told me you can use it as single run cable as i do not bother with the bi- wiring thing . then the next cable up from that was the 44 which adds a £100 on top just to have a little bit more copper on the core but they told me this cables are the cheapest cables from audioquest the start of the range but if you feeling flush they do some for £23.000 cheap *wacko* not ! solid silver cables . but even though i got this i will still will have a play at making my own up so i will be buying some solid silver from wires .uk and see what they will sound like

Nice. I'd go for the star-quad since the Type 4 was similar and sounded good, though a bit lean in the bass. But the R33 is twice the T4, so I don't think you'll have a current bottleneck here.

Don't worry about bi-wiring or single, I've used the T4 either way. Dali Opticon 8 supports bi-wiring, so if you have the Rocket 33 with 4 banana plugs as factory default, don't modify the cable and use it in bi-wiring at the speaker end.

 

[Benedict_Arnold]

Anyone know where in the uk I can buy 18-16 gage solid cooper core speaker cable please I have looked around but can not find a uk site that sells it I do not want anything fancy just something that will do the job without costing a arm and a leg . 

The main reason stranded cables are normally used is for ease of installation. There's no performance advantage to using solid core and it's a real pain in the bum to handle.

While I normally agree with TrevC, in this case he isn't 100% correct. 

Skin effect is the tendency of electrons to flow closer to the surface of a conductor as the frequency of the signal increases.  While not significant for home audio, the effect is real and even at audio frequencies a current gradient exists in the cable with more current flowing near the surface than at the cable core.  Depending on cable construction, over a cable length, individual strands may spend some distance toward the cable core and some distance toward the cable edge. As a strand moves toward the centre of the cable, a portion of the current will jump to an adjacent strand to stay relatively closer to the cable surface.  This 'strand jumping' can take place many times over a cable length depending on its construction. This jumping involves the electrons crossing copper / copper oxide / copper oxide / copper boundaries on the strand surfaces as they jump. Just the thought of this is enough to give the OFC single crystal brigade nightmares. 

Solid cable does not have this problem, and arguably will provide a (probably inaudible) improved route for the signal.  There are some manufacturers who have fancy basket weaves and plastic cable cores to keep the strands a constant distance from the cable centre to avoid this issue - just use solid cable....

Soild cable is tough to bend, but how often do you move your amp or speakers? It does have the advantage of staying put when you route it.

Finally, unless you don't like the look, there is no need to strip mains 'twin and earth' solid cable and twist the conductors.  This provides no audible benefit.  The inductive effect mentioned above is dependent on the conductors being run close together, not being twisted.  There are a number of 'HiFi' speaker cables (Naim being one) that run conductors in parallel without a twist.  

So for about 50p per metre, you can buy 2.5mmsq solid copper twin and earth cable, which I believe makes excellent speaker cable. Unlike most nonsense claims for cables, there is actually a solid (no pun intended) basis for solid cables have sonic (but probably inaudible) benefits over stranded.

no the hifi stays were it is all the time . i did read that solid silver core is much better to use but much more money to buy but silver coated sliver will sound bright but not sure if this claim is true or not . but i went on the audioquest web site last night and there top cables sell for around £23.000 which is shocking

I have taken the pledge never to comment on speaker cable posts.

BUT....

If you want expensive cable consider this....

Someone who's mother worked on the manatten project once told me that during the project, they had a problem getting enough electricity from the nearest available power station. So they emptied Fort Knox and had all the gold made into power cables. The much lower impedance of 24 carat gold apparently gave then the extra juice they needed.
Don't know if it's really true or not, but...

 

[Blacksabbath25]

Did you get the double star-quad geometry?

double star quad but they told me you can use it as single run cable as i do not bother with the bi- wiring thing . then the next cable up from that was the 44 which adds a £100 on top just to have a little bit more copper on the core but they told me this cables are the cheapest cables from audioquest the start of the range but if you feeling flush they do some for £23.000 cheap *wacko* not ! solid silver cables . but even though i got this i will still will have a play at making my own up so i will be buying some solid silver from wires .uk and see what they will sound like

Nice. I'd go for the star-quad since the Type 4 was similar and sounded good, though a bit lean in the bass. But the R33 is twice the T4, so I don't think you'll have a current bottleneck here.

Don't worry about bi-wiring or single, I've used the T4 either way. Dali Opticon 8 supports bi-wiring, so if you have the Rocket 33 with 4 banana plugs as factory default, don't modify the cable and use it in bi-wiring at the speaker end.

they had type 4 audioquest but that's not a very big cable but the rocket 33 I got is the one for bi-wiring but I can not use it for bi-wiring even though my Dali 8s have the option for bi-wiring but as the abrahamsen has only a left and right inputs for one run of speaker cable per side but the man from the Hifi shop phoned up audioquest and they said I could still use it as a single run cable by joining them up which to be honest I am still a bit confused by as the speaker cables will come terminated with audioquest plugs on already

 

[Blacksabbath25]

Anyone know where in the uk I can buy 18-16 gage solid cooper core speaker cable please I have looked around but can not find a uk site that sells it I do not want anything fancy just something that will do the job without costing a arm and a leg .

The main reason stranded cables are normally used is for ease of installation. There's no performance advantage to using solid core and it's a real pain in the bum to handle.

While I normally agree with TrevC, in this case he isn't 100% correct.

Skin effect is the tendency of electrons to flow closer to the surface of a conductor as the frequency of the signal increases. While not significant for home audio, the effect is real and even at audio frequencies a current gradient exists in the cable with more current flowing near the surface than at the cable core. Depending on cable construction, over a cable length, individual strands may spend some distance toward the cable core and some distance toward the cable edge. As a strand moves toward the centre of the cable, a portion of the current will jump to an adjacent strand to stay relatively closer to the cable surface. This 'strand jumping' can take place many times over a cable length depending on its construction. This jumping involves the electrons crossing copper / copper oxide / copper oxide / copper boundaries on the strand surfaces as they jump. Just the thought of this is enough to give the OFC single crystal brigade nightmares.

Solid cable does not have this problem, and arguably will provide a (probably inaudible) improved route for the signal. There are some manufacturers who have fancy basket weaves and plastic cable cores to keep the strands a constant distance from the cable centre to avoid this issue - just use solid cable....

Soild cable is tough to bend, but how often do you move your amp or speakers? It does have the advantage of staying put when you route it.

Finally, unless you don't like the look, there is no need to strip mains 'twin and earth' solid cable and twist the conductors. This provides no audible benefit. The inductive effect mentioned above is dependent on the conductors being run close together, not being twisted. There are a number of 'HiFi' speaker cables (Naim being one) that run conductors in parallel without a twist.

So for about 50p per metre, you can buy 2.5mmsq solid copper twin and earth cable, which I believe makes excellent speaker cable. Unlike most nonsense claims for cables, there is actually a solid (no pun intended) basis for solid cables have sonic (but probably inaudible) benefits over stranded.

no the hifi stays were it is all the time . i did read that solid silver core is much better to use but much more money to buy but silver coated sliver will sound bright but not sure if this claim is true or not . but i went on the audioquest web site last night and there top cables sell for around £23.000 which is shocking

I have taken the pledge never to comment on speaker cable posts.

BUT....

If you want expensive cable consider this....

Someone who's mother worked on the manatten project once told me that during the project, they had a problem getting enough electricity from the nearest available power station. So they emptied Fort Knox and had all the gold made into power cables. The much lower impedance of 24 carat gold apparently gave then the extra juice they needed. Don't know if it's really true or not, but...

most probably true as gold is a good conducter but I read on the Internet that pure sliver is even better then gold as a conducter

 

[hybridauth_Facebook_100004211376004]

you just join the 2 cable runs together before adding the bannana plugs for biwiring the ampside,it's a waste of time and cable imho.

 

[Blacksabbath25]

you just join the 2 cable runs together for biwiring the ampside,it's a waste of time and cable imho.

yes I do agree with you on that bi-wiring is a wast of money but most of the audioquest products are this way for some reason

 

[Vladimir]

I have taken the pledge never to comment on speaker cable posts.

BUT....

If you want expensive cable consider this....

Someone who's mother worked on the manatten project once told me that during the project, they had a problem getting enough electricity from the nearest available power station. So they emptied Fort Knox and had all the gold made into power cables. The much lower impedance of 24 carat gold apparently gave then the extra juice they needed. Don't know if it's really true or not, but...

Are you sure that was the Manhattan and not the Montauk Project? Art Bell probably appreciates good cables too.

 

[BigH]

You could have bought yourself some tellurium q black for that cash.

thanks for that i will keep that in mind but the trouble is when buying this cables most of the hifi shops around my way have no demo speaker cables to try first before you buy and plus the fact its a specal order in job from the company that makes it so its a risk if the cable sounds bad and a lot of money to wast if got it wrong *smile*

Oh special order, hmmm. Always can flog them on some hifi forum.

 

[Blacksabbath25]

You could have bought yourself some tellurium q black for that cash.

thanks for that i will keep that in mind but the trouble is when buying this cables most of the hifi shops around my way have no demo speaker cables to try first before you buy and plus the fact its a specal order in job from the company that makes it so its a risk if the cable sounds bad and a lot of money to wast if got it wrong *smile*

Oh special order, hmmm. Always can flog them on some hifi forum.

*smile*

 

[hybridauth_Facebook_100004211376004]

I have some mogami 2972 lying around that is similar...in that it is a quad core cable and i can see how it could be confusing about converting it to single wired use if already in a biwired configuration.Although off the top of my head i'm not sure which colour is joined to which colour(cable that is).Iv'e read in the past that there is an optimal configuration for them.

 

[Blacksabbath25]

I have some mogami 2972 lying around that is similar...in that it is a quad core cable and i can see how it could be confusing about converting it to single wired use if already in a biwired configuration.Although off the top of my head i'm not sure which colour is joined to which colour(cable that is).Iv'e read in the past that there is an optimal configuration for them.

I did come across a audioquest utube video showing you which colours to join up to make it a single run of cable and also they have marked up the cable as well in 2 ways 1 . With bass driver / treble side for bi-wiring so one of the cores must be much bigger on the bass freq for audioquest to mark up the cable in this way . 2. normal positive + negative so I take it you join 2 positives together and 2 negatives together . But like I have said before it's coming terminate so whether I have to take the plugs of I am not sure . But when I go to pick them up from the shop I will have a look before I walk away as its pointless buying and paying for cables to be terminated just to take them apart as I can not see me getting the plugs back on as they are cold pressed on with a special tool

 

[TrevC]

Anyone know where in the uk I can buy 18-16 gage solid cooper core speaker cable please I have looked around but can not find a uk site that sells it I do not want anything fancy just something that will do the job without costing a arm and a leg .

The main reason stranded cables are normally used is for ease of installation. There's no performance advantage to using solid core and it's a real pain in the bum to handle.

While I normally agree with TrevC, in this case he isn't 100% correct.

Skin effect is the tendency of electrons to flow closer to the surface of a conductor as the frequency of the signal increases. While not significant for home audio, the effect is real and even at audio frequencies a current gradient exists in the cable with more current flowing near the surface than at the cable core. Depending on cable construction, over a cable length, individual strands may spend some distance toward the cable core and some distance toward the cable edge. As a strand moves toward the centre of the cable, a portion of the current will jump to an adjacent strand to stay relatively closer to the cable surface. This 'strand jumping' can take place many times over a cable length depending on its construction. This jumping involves the electrons crossing copper / copper oxide / copper oxide / copper boundaries on the strand surfaces as they jump. Just the thought of this is enough to give the OFC single crystal brigade nightmares.

Solid cable does not have this problem, and arguably will provide a (probably inaudible) improved route for the signal. There are some manufacturers who have fancy basket weaves and plastic cable cores to keep the strands a constant distance from the cable centre to avoid this issue - just use solid cable....

Soild cable is tough to bend, but how often do you move your amp or speakers? It does have the advantage of staying put when you route it.

Finally, unless you don't like the look, there is no need to strip mains 'twin and earth' solid cable and twist the conductors. This provides no audible benefit. The inductive effect mentioned above is dependent on the conductors being run close together, not being twisted. There are a number of 'HiFi' speaker cables (Naim being one) that run conductors in parallel without a twist.

So for about 50p per metre, you can buy 2.5mmsq solid copper twin and earth cable, which I believe makes excellent speaker cable. Unlike most nonsense claims for cables, there is actually a solid (no pun intended) basis for solid cables have sonic (but probably inaudible) benefits over stranded.

no the hifi stays were it is all the time . i did read that solid silver core is much better to use but much more money to buy but silver coated sliver will sound bright but not sure if this claim is true or not . but i went on the audioquest web site last night and there top cables sell for around £23.000 which is shocking

I have taken the pledge never to comment on speaker cable posts.

BUT....

If you want expensive cable consider this....

Someone who's mother worked on the manatten project once told me that during the project, they had a problem getting enough electricity from the nearest available power station. So they emptied Fort Knox and had all the gold made into power cables. The much lower impedance of 24 carat gold apparently gave then the extra juice they needed. Don't know if it's really true or not, but...

It's not true. Gold has a lower conductivity than copper or silver. The strand jumping stuff above is nonsense too.

If you want to splash out (eg. £7 per metre for Van Damme http://tinyurl.com/zogvk7p) on cable go for 6mm copper multistrand. Nice low resistance and really can't be bettered because of that. Silver isn't worth the extra cash.

 

[Vladimir]

It's not true. Gold has a lower conductivity than copper or silver. The strand jumping stuff above is nonsense too.

If you want to splash out (£7 per metre for Van Damme) on cable go for 6mm copper multistrand. Nice low resistance and can't be bettered because of it. Silver isn't worth the extra cash.

I personally use the KERNKRAFT 400 on everything.

 

[nopiano]

It's not true. Gold has a lower conductivity than copper or silver. The strand jumping stuff above is nonsense too.

If you want to splash out (£7 per metre for Van Damme) on cable go for 6mm copper multistrand. Nice low resistance and can't be bettered because of it. Silver isn't worth the extra cash.

I personally use the KERNKRAFT 400 on everything.

. brilliant....!

 

[andyjm]

.... the strand jumping stuff above is nonsense too.

That's a bit harsh. The effect is real, though almost certainly not audible.

 

[andyjm]

Gold has a lower conductivity than copper or silver.

At least TrevC and I agree about something.

An interesting fact is that aluminium is the best conductor by weight, silver the best by volume. When I last checked, most speaker cables installations aren't limited by either weight or volume, so the easiest way to get better conductivity is to just use thicker copper.

Gold is used for connectors, not because of its conductivity, but because of its resistance to surface corrosion.

 

[Blacksabbath25]

Did you get the double star-quad geometry?

I just phoned the shop I have ordered double star-quad single run cable not for bi-wiring . They said it's what they use in the expensive cables that audioquest do . That's a relief I thought I ordered the bi-wiring stuff which I didn't need

 

[radiorog]

Gold has a lower conductivity than copper or silver.

At least TrevC and I agree about something.

An interesting fact is that aluminium is the best conductor by weight, silver the best by volume. When I last checked, most speaker cables installations aren't limited by either weight or volume, so the easiest way to get better conductivity is to just use thicker copper.

Gold is used for connectors, not because of its conductivity, but because of its resistance to surface corrosion.

Indeed, that is interesting. With regards to gold terminations, does this not cause a bottle neck effect then, if it is not as good a conductor as the actual wire, and make the whole thing of trying to find the best wire pointless once it reaches an equal level of conductance (?) to the gold?

 

[TrevC]

With regards to gold terminations, does this not cause a bottle neck effect then, if it is not as good a conductor as the actual wire, and make the whole thing of trying to find the best wire pointless once it reaches an equal level of conductance (?) to the gold?

It's just a coating. No bottle neck.

 

[Vladimir]

Did you get the double star-quad geometry?

I just phoned the shop I have ordered double star-quad single run cable not for bi-wiring . They said it's what they use in the expensive cables that audioquest do . That's a relief I thought I ordered the bi-wiring stuff which I didn't need

Perfect. *dance4*

 

[radiorog]

With regards to gold terminations, does this not cause a bottle neck effect then, if it is not as good a conductor as the actual wire, and make the whole thing of trying to find the best wire pointless once it reaches an equal level of conductance (?) to the gold?

It's just a coating. No bottle neck.

Cool. Cheers *good*