Speaker cables letting the team down?

[hifikrazy]

I'm finding that my system (shown in my profile) is rather too bright in the top end and too forward in the upper mid. I have a feeling that it's the QED Silver Anniversary XT biwire that's letting the team down. I'm planning to go for better quality non-biwire cables in the interest of cost (as I'm running fairly long 6 meter lengths), so that I can buy a higher model non-biwire cable rather than a lower end biwire cable.

Two cables that I have my eye on are the Chord Odyssey and the DNM Stereo Solid Core. Any opinion of them would be appreciated, as well as any other suggestions that would bring some much needed warmth to my system. Thanks.

 

[vonchief]

van den hul cs122 calmed down my slightly bright rotel 10 series with epos speakers.I tried many cables from chord and qed and even though its not the most expensive i rate it very highly.

 

[Anonymous]

hifikrazy:I'm finding that my system (shown in my profile) is rather too bright in the top end and too forward in the upper mid. I have a feeling that it's the QED Silver Anniversary XT biwire that's letting the team down. I'm planning to go for better quality non-biwire cables in the interest of cost (as I'm running fairly long 6 meter lengths), so that I can buy a higher model non-biwire cable rather than a lower end biwire cable.

Two cables that I have my eye on are the Chord Odyssey and the DNM Stereo Solid Core. Any opinion of them would be appreciated, as well as any other suggestions that would bring some much needed warmth to my system. Thanks.

Test them both from a dealer krazy?

 

[Anonymous]

Consider the Kimber 8TC. Allegedly rather a good cable for lively systems.

 

[Anonymous]

hifikrazy:I'm finding that my system (shown in my profile) is rather too bright in the top end and too forward in the upper mid. I have a feeling that it's the QED Silver Anniversary XT biwire that's letting the team down. I'm planning to go for better quality non-biwire cables in the interest of cost (as I'm running fairly long 6 meter lengths), so that I can buy a higher model non-biwire cable rather than a lower end biwire cable. Two cables that I have my eye on are the Chord Odyssey and the DNM Stereo Solid Core. Any opinion of them would be appreciated, as well as any other suggestions that would bring some much needed warmth to my system. Thanks.

Pardon the dumb question but... what's the difference between bright and forward? And how to you define "forward"? (what does "forward" sounds like?)

 

[hifikrazy]

momo72:

Pardon the dumb question but... what's the difference between bright and forward? And how to you define "forward"? (what does "forward" sounds like?)

Maybe I'm not using the right terminology but by bright, I meant the higher frequencies are too "sparkly", and by forward, I was describing that the upper mids especially the vocals are too pronounced and hard... sort of like the notes are edgy and not rounded enough.

I think I may have confused you some more.

 

[Anonymous]

I have been using Kimber 4TC Cables in my system for years now, they go so well with my Sonus Faber Minuetos, and I would not change them. Mind you they are bi wired and I have not priced them lately.

Good luck in your search.

 

[Anonymous]

I believe PMC, one of the most respected speaker manufacturers in the world, use a £4/m VDH cable exclusively, both in house and in their professional installations. I use a £2/m cable by Belden the 5000UP. BTW, the 5000UP has, I believe, the same, if not better electrical characteristics as the DNM solid core cable. Therefore, it seems logical to assume that it will perform in exactly the same way, for a fraction of the price. You can buy online from Mark Grant Cables. At that price, it must be worth a gamble, rather than pay probably £ hundreds for an exotic cable.

 

[Anonymous]

Seplticman puts it well. Cables can only make a minor difference to a system unless you have amazingly long runs, so buy cheap.

Quad is another of the "cable makes no difference" brigade, by the way.

.

 

[Anonymous]

Looking at your profile you have a very revealing kit of the highest quality. I can totally understand what you are saying.

I have been using Kimber 4TC (£27 per mtr) for many years now and it is one of the best cables I have ever heard on a revealing system.
I doubt stepping up to the 8TC will give you more benefit as it is not detail you are lacking.

Years ago I was running Rogers LS7 modified with hand built crossovers, Kimber 4TC internal and speaker cables.. They sounded that you were in the room with the musicians, totally natural. Kimber 4TC added that bit of extra depth without the brittleness which was the problem I had auditioning with others.
I would still bi-wire, 2 x 4TC will be better than 1 x 8TC.

 

[Anonymous]

Trevor 79,

Don't mean to hijack the thread but I see you mentioned in another post using blutack between speaker and stand. Was this just to avoid them falling off, or is there potential acoustic benefit?

 

[Anonymous]

It's the cheapest Hi-Fi upgrade I know!

Using only the tiniest amount (less is more) it will give a solid contact with the stands and cut out vibration between the surfaces.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks, Trevor 69, I'll try it. Hopefully it will avoid the young dog/expensive speaker disaster scenario, too!

 

[Anonymous]

There is at least one chart knocking around on the internet that tells you the wire guage required for a run of cable, i.e. the longer the run, the thicker the cable required. Unfortunately, the one I saw was part of an article debunking exotic cables. It basically said, the thicker the cable the better.

 

[Anonymous]

Sorry, to clarify, I meant the thicker the copper the better, not the sometimes enormous amount of shielding put round the copper.

 

[Anonymous]

Yes, impedence grows the longer the run.
Thicker wires have lower impedence.

Also to factor into things is the longer the run the higher the microphonic pick up will be on the cables.
Which leads to harshness!

So a big question is do the speakers need to be 6 mtrs away from your source?

If the equipment could be sited nearer a far improved enjoyable soundstage could well be noticed.

 

[hifikrazy]

Thank you all for the advice. So it sounds like I should be looking for Kimber, Van Den Hul or any thick gauge cable.

For the moment, the equipment does have to be 6 meters away but I hope to find a new home for my system this year which will allow me to make do with the standard 2 to 3 meters. Another benefit of the shorter length of course is that it would allow me to buy higher model cables with the same amount of money. Also, if I were ebaying for speaker cables, lengths between 2 to 3 meters are very common while 6 meters is quite difficult to come across.

Perhaps I might hold off on the expensive cables for now and take the advice to just go for some thick cheapo cables. Then when I find my system a new home, I can look for a shorter length of cables. But then again, somebody mentioned here that speaker cables don't make a difference so I may as well stick to my QED rather than buy the cheapo cables.

 

[JoelSim]

I'm not being rude HFK, but your kit all seems to be on the bright/forward side, and probably together results in a somewhat harsh sound. I would be tempted to swap either the CD player or the amp first off for something less bright.

 

[hifikrazy]

Nothing rude...all honest advice is more than welcome.

I was hoping that the tube preamp would lend some warmth to my sound but now realise that AR preamps are very detailed and don't give the typical "tubey" sound, even after I switched the stock tubes to Mullards which are well known for being warm.

Still, I would prefer to retain the pre/power amps so would you have any advice on what CD player I should target for?

Also, I hear that most of the Van Den Hul and Cardas interconnects can inject some warmth into a system.

 

[Anonymous]

trevor79:
Also to factor into things is the longer the run the higher the microphonic pick up will be on the cables.
Which leads to harshness!

Microphony on speaker cables? I think not.

You're spot on with this bit though.

>Yes, impedence grows the longer the run.
>Thicker wires have lower impedence.

Which is all you have to worry about with speaker cables.

 

[Anonymous]

 

[Anonymous]

Morning Grimly ;-)

 

[Anonymous]

Just saw this on EBay, might be worth checking out....

Audiophile SINGLE CRYSTAL COPPER speaker cable per mtr

 

[Anonymous]

I would suggest thick gauge wire. Wire is sometimes measured using the AWG scale. A thickness I often hear recommended is 10 guage.

I would imagine £4/m Van Damme would be fine. 10 guage is 5.26mm squared in cross section.

 

[hifikrazy]

OK, so I just concluded a listening session, the main purpose of which was to determine if biwiring works on my system or not, thereby determining my choice of single wire or biwire when I upgrade my cables.

The sad result (for my wallet that is) is that biwiring is clearly better. If you recall, I'm currently running QED Silver Anniversary XT Biwire, so all i did was to remove one pair of the connections from each speaker and connect the links.

Now I'm not sure how much can be blamed on the quality of the metal links, but the biwire option had clearly better bass definition, openness and transparency. I've just been catching up on some old threads on biwiring and I know that there are some people like Anton who can hear the difference with biwiring (guess I fall into that same camp now), those that can't, and those that say it depends on the speakers.

So back to the drawing block. Was rather keen on the single wire Chord Odyssey 2, but now have to look at Odyssey 4 instead, which sadly costs double the price or 210 quid more given my 6 meter runs. Sigh...