# Silver Wire = Incredible Sound



## normalicy

I'm sorry, but this just ain't so. In fact, it doesn't matter what conductor you use, so long as you use enough of it. You could use pencil lead if you wish, but due to it's resistance, you'd have to graphite that is about 2-3 times thicker than copper/silver. Same thing for power wire. There's nothing wrong with using something other than copper, just make sure you have it thick enough that the material isn't saturated at full power. It's simple physics people. You do realize that your ground wire to the battery is a big hunk of steel called the frame of your car.

Nope, your sound quality will not be affected. No, your amps won't be starved. Yes, you are delusional if you hear a difference.

That said, the lower resistance wire you use (copper & silver in particular) the thinner it can be & thus the easier to run & bend.


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## paulc35

normalicy said:


> I'm sorry, but this just ain't so. In fact, it doesn't matter what conductor you use, so long as you use enough of it. You could use pencil lead if you wish, but due to it's resistance, you'd have to graphite that is about 2-3 times thicker than copper/silver. Same thing for power wire. There's nothing wrong with using something other than copper, just make sure you have it thick enough that the material isn't saturated at full power. It's simple physics people. You do realize that your ground wire to the battery is a big hunk of steel called the frame of your car.
> 
> Nope, your sound quality will not be affected. No, your amps won't be starved. Yes, you are delusional if you hear a difference.
> 
> That said, the lower resistance wire you use (copper & silver in particular) the thinner it can be & thus the easier to run & bend.


Well never seen this topic in car audio and i use to think the same but you need a high end home audio system to hear the effects of silver over copper. If you have never sat down in front of a high end system then i suggest u go into a high end audio store and have them switch out the interconnect from preamp to amp. Products like nelson pass, thiel, BAT, Cary Audio. Some solid silver from HTC IS pleasant while silver clad can cause the high frequency to be down right irritating.


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## redwave designs

I once was at a buddys house, listening to his high end system with "gas charged" speaker wire. It was that day that I made a promise to myself....never let my audio obsession get that far!

I've heard a lot of debates on exquisite conductors, this thread should be interesting...


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## dougelam

normalicy said:


> You do realize that your ground wire to the battery is a big hunk of steel called the frame of your car.


The ground wire is a 2-4guage wire mounted to the engine and not the frame. A secondary wire is run to the chassis and there are a lot of problems with that connection on quite a few model cars.



normalicy said:


> That said, the lower resistance wire you use (copper & silver in particular) the thinner it can be & thus the easier to run & bend.


I think you are forgetting the heat build up factor, copper holds its resistance better under heat than other conductors, but only to a point. The larger gauge keeps the resistance down. Other conductors also corrode quicker than copper.

Just a thought


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## slvrtsunami

this is very etheral and opinionated. Sub'd never the less.


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## arw01

It's pretty well established that most people cannot hear crappy music and know it. Look at how ****ty cd's can sound with mashed dynamic range etc, but they still sell millions of em.

Now speaker wires I don't know if you can hear a difference. Audiophile magazine did a test with some golden ears and coat hanger wire and they couldn't tell.

On inter-connects I do believe there can be a difference in the high end and the position of the sound stage. In my skeptical youth I spent the money for streetwire flexconnect over cheap inter-connects. In my car I could hear a difference. From the one up flexconnect to the more expensive stuff, nope no difference to me. From the cheap ass inter-connects to flexconnect, yes.

Alan


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## GRIFTER9931

arw01 said:


> It's pretty well established that most people cannot hear crappy music and know it. Look at how ****ty cd's can sound with mashed dynamic range etc, but they still sell millions of em.
> 
> Now speaker wires I don't know if you can hear a difference. Audiophile magazine did a test with some golden ears and coat hanger wire and they couldn't tell.
> 
> On inter-connects I do believe there can be a difference in the high end and the position of the sound stage. In my skeptical youth I spent the money for streetwire flexconnect over cheap inter-connects. In my car I could hear a difference. From the one up flexconnect to the more expensive stuff, nope no difference to me. From the cheap ass inter-connects to flexconnect, yes.
> 
> Alan


Someone did this (the coat hangers) @ Nam a few years ago!!!
I laughed for a while after I saw the setup.


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## Ludemandan

Let's not forget that resistance is not the only component of impedance. 

Impedance = the combination of resistance, capacitance and inductance. However, both resistance and impedance are measured in ohms so it can be confusing.

Resistance is the only factor in DC. Capacitance is not a factor as long as the voltage is not changing, and inductance is not a factor as long as current is not changing. 

A car audio signal isn't strictly AC the way your house mains are AC because the signal is always positive, rather than positive/negative. However, the preamp output is varying voltage, which causes varying current in the power wire and speaker wires. I like to think of it as variable DC, which essentially makes it AC with regard to impedance. 

Paired wires like audio interconnects are subject to capacitance and inductance, and the thing that affects resistance (wire size and ohms per foot) doesn't affect capacitance and inductance. I don't know how much they affect audio quality, but the folks at MIT cables have lots of literature explaining why it does (and why their products correct for these effects). MIT Cables Technical / Whitepapers | Articles | Publications


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## normalicy

Fortunately, I was fully expecting an onslaught of opinion on this post & will admit that I don't have a lab where I've tested every aspect. I will say thought that it has been tested to death by both camps & they both think they're right. Oh & I have spent plenty of time in front of $20,000 speakers driven by similarly expensive sources with both good & crappy wire (have friends). Really the difference if there is one is completely lost in the switch not that a properly commissioned salesperson would admit as much.



> The ground wire is a 2-4guage wire mounted to the engine and not the frame. A secondary wire is run to the chassis and there are a lot of problems with that connection on quite a few model cars.


In fact, any conductor between your alternator/batteries (depending on what is providing the highest voltage at the time) negative post & your amplifier or what not is considered the ground wire. You're just nitpicking. And unless you have a truck or car that's pretty old, your frame IS the chassis which is once again nitpicking. Yes, it is a source of trouble. But usually that source of trouble is more because of improper interconnection than the actual chassis itself.



> I think you are forgetting the heat build up factor, copper holds its resistance better under heat than other conductors, but only to a point. The larger gauge keeps the resistance down. Other conductors also corrode quicker than copper.


In fact, I didn't. This is why I mentioned making sure the material of choice isn't saturated. Which is why aluminum would be a very poor choice unless you want some rather thick cables. Yet it conducts quite well.



> Let's not forget that resistance is not the only component of impedance.
> 
> Impedance = the combination of resistance, capacitance and inductance. However, both resistance and impedance are measured in ohms so it can be confusing.
> 
> Resistance is the only factor in DC. Capacitance is not a factor as long as the voltage is not changing, and inductance is not a factor as long as current is not changing.
> 
> A car audio signal isn't strictly AC the way your house mains are AC because the signal is always positive, rather than positive/negative. However, the preamp output is varying voltage, which causes varying current in the power wire and speaker wires. I like to think of it as variable DC, which essentially makes it AC with regard to impedance


Yes, I was going a bit extreme with the mention of pencil lead. I agree that there are other factors other than resistance. But capacitance can be a factor in more extreme conductors that aren't used regularly (such as pencil lead). Though I doubt 98% of people would notice the difference still.



> but the folks at MIT cables have lots of literature explaining why it does (and why their products correct for these effects). MIT Cables Technical / Whitepapers | Articles | Publications


No offense, but I wouldn't trust any wire manufacturer's literature exclusively. They're entire existence depends on selling you on the idea that their stuff actually works better than stuff that is 98% as good as theirs. Not to say that there isn't some truth, but it's amazing how convincing they can be over irrelevant issues.

I would like to say before this gets off topic that my main issue is with the conductors used & not the interconnects. There lies the weakest link in the audio/power chain.


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## The Baron Groog

RE Speaker wire:

Many years ago, when I was in my teens, MAX POWER magazine used to be quite informative and actually do proper tests on all components and accessories. Adam Rayner, still a respected car audio journo/face, did a test of various speaker wires in which he measured the inductance and capacitance of the cables. While these figures were pretty low they would have a bearing on the overall sound of the system-how much of a bearing would depend on the length of cable used-what % it was I cannot remember-does anyone have any more knowledge on this?

RE Power cable:
They also did some tests with OFCC kits, so old a test they were all OFCC no CCA, and found massive differences between brand X and Y's resistance-so while I'd like to believe all cables are the same they're clearly not-unfortunately no magazines publish this sort of info any more:

Maybe DIYMA should do some tests?


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## normalicy

> Many years ago, when I was in my teens, MAX POWER magazine used to be quite informative and actually do proper tests on all components and accessories. Adam Rayner, still a respected car audio journo/face, did a test of various speaker wires in which he measured the inductance and capacitance of the cables. While these figures were pretty low they would have a bearing on the overall sound of the system-how much of a bearing would depend on the length of cable used-what % it was I cannot remember-does anyone have any more knowledge on this?


I suspect though, if the cables which had higher variance in inductance/capacitance were increased in size that difference would become very difficult to measure. But yes, if comparing directly at the same gauge, I suspect this is very true.



> RE Power cable:
> They also did some tests with OFCC kits, so old a test they were all OFCC no CCA, and found massive differences between brand X and Y's resistance-so while I'd like to believe all cables are the same they're clearly not-unfortunately no magazines publish this sort of info any more:


I never said that there wasn't a difference between manufacturing quality. There certainly is. I've seen my fair share of cables that blatantly lied about either the size or quality of the conductors. That is another subject.



> Maybe DIYMA should do some tests?


Certainly would be interesting.

Unfortunately, variables can get the best of even the most thorough people. Listening tests in particular are terribly subjective. You could use measuring instruments, but then people would argue that it isn't the same as hearing.


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## tornaido_3927

Would the tests be subjective though, and therefore people would dismiss them anyway?


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## Z80_Man

It may still have some effects anyway, but they are of electrical order.

BTW, copper may oxydate deeply (even oxygen free lead can suffer from that with time, and being oxydated several inches deep under the sheath at each end of the cable - often seen on old wiring in the car's door, where a lot of moisture is circulating), while silver is harder to oxydate (it actually just makes a thin protective layer on its surface, as for aluminium).

Silver still has a better conduction than copper, and minimizing the resistance helps minimizing power losses (though they may actually be too tiny to be noticed). Howether, a heavily oxydated cable can corrupt the sound enough to be heared, so you can still imagine there's a gradation from a totally rotten and losely connected cable to a brand new and well tightened copper one... To a silver one.

It's sometimes said it helps getting more precise and detailed trebble, especially at the higher frequencies.

There's actually a better way to help high frequencies : using multi-wire cables instead of a single conductor simple one. This is because a phenomenon occurs at the higher frequencies : the skin effect. The current concentrates on the external surface of the cable's core, even if it's not solid plain copper, but multi-wire : as they're all touching one another, the cable behaves like a plain one. The consequence is an important reduction in the usable section of the cable, hence an important increase of its resistance.

Using an isolated multi-wire cable (you can try phone or network cable, or any kind having even more wires - maybe old-fashion parallel printer cable, for instance) allows you to split the signal into several conductors on which it will travel along their external surfaces, then joining them again at the other end.

This trick is often used in high end self-made audio setups, and is known for giving effective results - much more than using sliver instead of copper.

Anyway, if you can find cheap one, silver cable is still interesting for many purposes : best corrosion resistance, or an esthetic identifying method when combined with copper cable in transparent sheaths. 

I generally just use what I find at the local store, and if it's silver (or sometime just tinned copper), I certainly dismiss it just because it's a different color !


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## sleepingciv

Figured id throw my 2cents in here

I used Kicker 4 gauge silver tinned wire to relocate my battery in my 93 Toyota truck
Well after trying to start the truck i could never get the starter to engauge, but headlights and all other things worked.
Ended up being the wire did not carry enough volts to the starter. 9 volts i think it was. But ended up taking that out and replacing with some older Stinger untinned wire and truck started right up.
Me personally will never use silver tinned wire for anything, well maybe to hang something while i paint it lol


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## Z80_Man

LOL

Well, silver is still a better conductor than copper, it's just a physics fact. 

But since I use 2 gauge wire to my amps in the boot and it's not much thicker than the car's original alternator to battery wiring, maybe 4 gauge was really too thin ?

Well, I own a a turbo diesel car and diesel engines are renowned for their huge electrical consumption when starting (I actually replaced the original battery by a truck one in the trunk, because of the amps), so maybe they use thicker wire at GM for these cars...

4 gauge still seem way too thin to me, silver or not !


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## coyote-1

It's a vanity thing. Marketers know suckers when they see 'em, and feel it's unethical NOT to take a sucker's money :lol: And there ain't no bigger sucker than someone who is convinced that if he spends $4200 on speaker wire, his audio will now be pristine.


arw01 said:


> Now speaker wires I don't know if you can hear a difference. Audiophile magazine did a test with some golden ears and coat hanger wire and they couldn't tell.
> 
> Alan


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## nineball

paulc35 said:


> Well never seen this topic in car audio and i use to think the same but you need a high end home audio system to hear the effects of silver over copper. If you have never sat down in front of a high end system then i suggest u go into a high end audio store and have them switch out the interconnect from preamp to amp. Products like nelson pass, thiel, BAT, Cary Audio. Some solid silver from HTC IS pleasant while silver clad can cause the high frequency to be down right irritating.




you are comparing apples to oranges.


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## redwave designs

Myth, even if it were not a myth what would it matter?

How many hundreds of solder joints are in a head unit, processor, amplifier, x-over, speaker, RCA cables? What kind of conductors are used inside any of the above mentioned components? You can bet its not silver.

How many cable junctions are in a system?

Think about the condutive material used in transistors, resistors, ICs and other components. Its all cheap alloys that make mass production more profitable, simple as that.

When you take a wholistic look at your entire signal path, study the reflections that all the tranistion points induce, your silver speaker wire wouldn't even be relavant.


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## raamaudio

I turned down over $5k in sponsorship cable, wire, interconnects, dist blocks, etc once because I did not like the overmarketed hype, insane prices, bulky and overbuild stuff I could do better than for 1/0th the cost that I had to pay for myself. I refused to support such ridiculous products. 

I almost always use welding cable for power wire, cheap to buy, superb in performance. 
My highest end system was over $20k retail and I used Wire King speaker wires and made my own interconnects from Conare dual twisted pair mic cable(quite honestly I believe I may be the first one to use them in a vehicle). I did use Stinger Platinum series power distribution, batter terminals, etc because I liked the look, quality and price and after 180k miles, all sorts of weather in 4 states, etc....still doing the job just fine. 

I learned about the Conare, Star Quad, cable from a member of a local audio club in San Diego, he sold it where he worked at a surplus and supply store, electronics of course. His club had real rocket scientist members and they tested all the top brands, pure silver, etc, on the best test equipment ever made. This cable came so close to the performance, even up to 26 volts going through it, of the best they tested they came to the conclusion it could never be heard in a system. But, those that owned the pure silver stuff still used it because it was part of showing off how much they spent and they already had it anyway which we all know is a huge part of the crazy prices people will pay for sometimes pretty goofy stuff, much snake oil in high end audio. 

I do know copper, even oxygen free, will corrode on the ends, why I used marine grade heat shrink or other methods to seal them up in doors and other moisture prone locations. It is also a great idea to periodically loosen and then retighten the screws on all gear so to create a cleaner connection, better yet, Pro Gold when installed and loosen up and respray, tighten back up, once in awhile, great on Interconnects as well, I even use it on my tube sockets, good stuff!

After spending the money on $7k components, $1k HU just for digital out, ID DAC(if you ever get a change listen to one!), etc........spending 200+ hours just sound deadening...If I felt I could do better with expensive wire, cable, interconnects, I would not of hesitated to spend a ton on them as well but I had no need, doubt I ever will.

Rick


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## normalicy

> Would the tests be subjective though, and therefore people would dismiss them anyway?


Yes, thus the reason this issue has never been concluded.



> BTW, copper may oxydate deeply (even oxygen free lead can suffer from that with time, and being oxydated several inches deep under the sheath at each end of the cable - often seen on old wiring in the car's door, where a lot of moisture is circulating), while silver is harder to oxydate (it actually just makes a thin protective layer on its surface, as for aluminium).


If you solder the wire to the speaker, terminal, or just plain tin the end will deal with this issue. The corrosion does not actually penetrate that deep, it is very visible, but not too deep penetrating. Otherwise, you wouldn't be able to rub it off with steel wool. And if the wire is 99% pure, I've seen exposed ends shiny in a non-humid environment for years.



> I used kicker 4 gauge silver tinned wire to relocate my battery in my 93 Toyota truck
> Well after trying to start the truck i could never get the starter to engauge, but headlights and all other things worked.
> Ended up being the wire did not carry enough volts to the starter. 9 volts i think it was. But ended up taking that out and replacing with some older Stinger untinned wire and truck started right up.


You probably had a connection issue instead of a wire issue. There's no way that it would restrict the voltage that much unless it had a broken/corroded connection.



> Well, silver is still a better conductor than copper, it's just a physics fact.


I'm not arguing that silver is a poor conductor by any means. I'm only arguing that a sufficient amount of another conductor to carry a load is every bit as effective.


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## Ludemandan

redwave designs said:


> Myth, even if it were not a myth what would it matter?
> 
> How many hundreds of solder joints are in a head unit, processor, amplifier, x-over, speaker, RCA cables? What kind of conductors are used inside any of the above mentioned components? You can bet its not silver.
> 
> How many cable junctions are in a system?
> 
> Think about the condutive material used in transistors, resistors, ICs and other components. Its all cheap alloys that make mass production more profitable, simple as that.
> 
> When you take a wholistic look at your entire signal path, study the reflections that all the tranistion points induce, your silver speaker wire wouldn't even be relavant.


Actually, silver solder is commonly available at electrical supply stores. It's used as a substitute for lead. But I think the idea is safer handling. I don't know if it's used in high-end audio.



Z80_Man said:


> It may still have some effects anyway, but they are of electrical order.
> 
> BTW, copper may oxydate deeply (even oxygen free lead can suffer from that with time, and being oxydated several inches deep under the sheath at each end of the cable - often seen on old wiring in the car's door, where a lot of moisture is circulating), while silver is harder to oxydate (it actually just makes a thin protective layer on its surface, as for aluminium).
> 
> Silver still has a better conduction than copper, and minimizing the resistance helps minimizing power losses (though they may actually be too tiny to be noticed). Howether, a heavily oxydated cable can corrupt the sound enough to be heared, so you can still imagine there's a gradation from a totally rotten and losely connected cable to a brand new and well tightened copper one... To a silver one.
> 
> It's sometimes said it helps getting more precise and detailed trebble, especially at the higher frequencies.
> 
> There's actually a better way to help high frequencies : using multi-wire cables instead of a single conductor simple one. This is because a phenomenon occurs at the higher frequencies : the skin effect. The current concentrates on the external surface of the cable's core, even if it's not solid plain copper, but multi-wire : as they're all touching one another, the cable behaves like a plain one. The consequence is an important reduction in the usable section of the cable, hence an important increase of its resistance.
> 
> Using an isolated multi-wire cable (you can try phone or network cable, or any kind having even more wires - maybe old-fashion parallel printer cable, for instance) allows you to split the signal into several conductors on which it will travel along their external surfaces, then joining them again at the other end.
> 
> This trick is often used in high end self-made audio setups, and is known for giving effective results - much more than using sliver instead of copper.
> 
> Anyway, if you can find cheap one, silver cable is still interesting for many purposes : best corrosion resistance, or an esthetic identifying method when combined with copper cable in transparent sheaths.
> 
> I generally just use what I find at the local store, and if it's silver (or sometime just tinned copper), I certainly dismiss it just because it's a different color !


So the conductive area for high frequencies can be approximated by the circumference of the wire(s). Wouldn't a large wire then be just as good as multiple small wires?


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## normalicy

> So the conductive area for high frequencies can be approximated by the circumference of the wire(s). Wouldn't a large wire then be just as good as multiple small wires?


Actually, there is a known effect (Skin effect - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia). The higher frequency current is alternating at, the closer to the surface it will will travel. Thus, if your conductor has a very large surface area, it won't become as saturated. I'm not entirely convinced that having multi-stranded wire (uninsulated between strands) deals with the situation properly since it should be seen as a solid conductor by the electrons, but have no evidence to back it up. The real reason multi-conductor wire exists is two fold. One is to make wire flexible & the other is reliability (one strand breaks, the others will continue to carry current).


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## Ludemandan

Right, and that's why I'm saying the conductive area for higher frequencies can be approximated by the circumference of the wire, since the circumference is basically the conductive area.


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## CBRworm

In the home audio arena people spend tons of money on the power cable from the wall to their gear, then plug it into their house wiring which is 30 year old romex and it still goes into the same huge transformer that has 50 feet of wound copper in it.

They see huge improvements despite the fact that the wiring on both sides still sucks. Not something I would spend money on. But I have talked to many people who claim everything from 'airyness' to 'detail' to 'punch' and overall greatness from changing power cables.

I do use decent (not expensive) speaker cable, but my main concern is current carrying ability.


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## Oldl2NewSchool

Thank you for posting this. Far too often people forget about the fact that science has already answered many of these questions. Glad to see posts like this.


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## rape_ape

I had a neighbor across the street growing up who had a $25,000 turntable (just for the table, the arm and cartridge were extra) and all the associated high-end equipment downstream from there, including gigantic planar speakers. His sweet spot was a single spot occupied by a bean-bag chair. Point is, he was a audio freak and wasnt afraid to spend money buying equipment. Want to know what he used for speaker wire? Solid 12 gauge romex house wiring. His explanation was that the only thing that mattered was the "skin effect" and when you have multi-strand wiring the skins of each wire can interact and cause distortion in the signal. So by using 12 gauge solid wire, he had plenty of conductivity and plenty of surface area, and no noisy interactions between strands. This is probably why the coathangers sounded as good as supposed "boutique" wiring.

Also, for whoever posted that audio signals are "variable DC"? That is the stupidest thing I've ever read on this forum. (I've been around a lot longer than my present ID might indicate).


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## Ludemandan

rape_ape said:


> Also, "variable DC"? That is the stupidest thing I've ever read on this forum. (I've been around a lot longer than my present ID might indicate).


Okay, maybe it's a term I invented, but it's meant to distinguish from AC, which goes into negative voltage. Please disregard my stupidity and see my point.


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## sleepingciv

normalicy said:


> You probably had a connection issue instead of a wire issue. There's no way that it would restrict the voltage that much unless it had a broken/corroded connection.


RF terminal, ran wire straight from battery to starter. wire was new. I even took wire out of truck and ran from battery to starter and still nothing changed.


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## Sarthos

There is only one advantage I will concede with aluminum wire.

Current traveling through a wire is like fluid traveling through a pipe. More area=less pressure=slower flow. The smaller diameter of pipe you use, the faster fluid will flow (which is why oversized intakes on cars can result in lost horsepower, incoming air velocity is too slow). With wire, the smaller the diameter the faster the current travels. So a silver wire will have the same conductivity as copper wire but a smaller diameter, resulting in faster movement of current. Not sure how that might really help, but that's the case.


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## rape_ape

Ludemandan said:


> Okay, maybe it's a term I invented, but it's meant to distinguish from AC, which goes into negative voltage. Please disregard my stupidity and see my point.


Its what you meant by it that's what I found to be so stupid. What do you think it is that pulls a woofer cone backwards into the basket?


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## gijoe

Sarthos said:


> There is only one advantage I will concede with aluminum wire.
> 
> Current traveling through a wire is like fluid traveling through a pipe. More area=less pressure=slower flow. The smaller diameter of pipe you use, the faster fluid will flow (which is why oversized intakes on cars can result in lost horsepower, incoming air velocity is too slow). With wire, the smaller the diameter the faster the current travels. So a silver wire will have the same conductivity as copper wire but a smaller diameter, resulting in faster movement of current. Not sure how that might really help, but that's the case.


Oh is it now?


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## rape_ape

Sarthos said:


> There is only one advantage I will concede with aluminum wire.
> 
> Current traveling through a wire is like fluid traveling through a pipe. More area=less pressure=slower flow. The smaller diameter of pipe you use, the faster fluid will flow (which is why oversized intakes on cars can result in lost horsepower, incoming air velocity is too slow). With wire, the smaller the diameter the faster the current travels. So a silver wire will have the same conductivity as copper wire but a smaller diameter, resulting in faster movement of current. Not sure how that might really help, but that's the case.


wow. the second stupidest thing.


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## Z80_Man

Ludemandan said:


> So the conductive area for high frequencies can be approximated by the circumference of the wire(s). Wouldn't a large wire then be just as good as multiple small wires?


Yes, thinking about that, you're absolutely right ! 



rape_ape said:


> Want to know what he used for speaker wire? Solid 12 gauge romex house wiring. His explanation was that the only thing that mattered was the "skin effect" and when you have multi-strand wiring the skins of each wire can interact and cause distortion in the signal. So by using 12 gauge solid wire, he had plenty of conductivity and plenty of surface area, and no noisy interactions between strands. This is probably why the coathangers sounded as good as supposed "boutique" wiring.


Ok, so it has been actually tested. 

Looks like I've been out of these theories for too long ! 

The drawback, of course, is that rigid plain copper cable is hard to use in a car.

It could just make opening and closing the doors rather problematic !


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## chad

Skin effect happens in RF land, so it cannot be dis-proven, but nope for audio

This is why high power RF coax has basically a copper pipe for the center conductor. The flexible stuff... basically copper flexible conduit.


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## briansz

I'm a pretty harsh cable skeptic, but I will say some of you need to go listen to the Nordost power cord demo or the TAD/WBT binding post comparisons done at audio shows. I would have bet you $1000 I wouldn't hear a difference, and I'd have lost a grand.

I'm not asserting that speaker wire plinths or magic stones or freaking hyperdimensional christmas tree ornaments matter. But I did hear differences in power cords and in binding posts that I would not have believed unless I experienced it firsthand. A lot of this stuff is pure marketing crap, but despite the fluff, some very high end home systems are frighteningly good at reproducing a live performance. Go listen to a pair of YG Acoustics Anat Reference II's on $100,000 of electronics and you'll get the idea. _Something_ is different (and better).

To those who bring up the poor quality of house power, the really hard-core audiophiles are buying gold-plated breaker boxes and running dedicated lines. Not sure those matter much, but I could see a dedicated ground rod to lower ground resistance as an interesting possibility.

Is any of this audible in a vehicle? Who knows................


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## chad

briansz said:


> I'm a pretty harsh cable skeptic, but I will say some of you need to go listen to the Nordost power cord demo or the TAD/WBT binding post comparisons done at audio shows. I would have bet you $1000 I wouldn't hear a difference, and I'd have lost a grand.


I took apart a power cable one time that would pay 2 of my house payments, it's was funny/humbling.


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## sqshoestring

> Some so called "exotic" Cable Companies enjoy spreading the *fallacy* that Skin Effect can cause deleterious effects on your audio performance. While Skin Effect is a real world problem in high frequency applications such as RF Power and Transmission, it is negligible at audio frequencies as I will demonstrate in this article based on fundamental engineering and scientific principles.


Skin Effect Relevance in Speaker Cables — Reviews and News from Audioholics

Simple fact is we know a lot about electricity and the laws that govern it. So much current travels through wire made of copper or aluminum or silver, the common conductors. It is near impossible to find a copper wire not made of a minimum level of copper content that affects current flow, so the behavior of the current is known and no amount of fairy dust is going to change how electricity works.

IIRC oxygen free copper actually corrodes faster. Silver/silver coated is ideal for a car, but in the many years I have wired cars with copper if installed properly problems were very minimal. The funniest part is something like a speaker has _profound_ effects on the sound of a system, yet here people (er, wire companies) are touting how wire affects the sound where it does not except in possibly the most strange cases.

Here it is code to have two ground rods. A friend of mine got a power conditioner for his huge home system, he showed me where he can turn it up louder with it on than off, it sure makes a difference. But I doubt it does a thing for SQ under clipping. He is pushing the capacity of one 110v line, they are only good for 15 or 20 amps and a big HT can draw one down. I told him he better put a 12ga wire in for it or something lol, of course the thing is louder than a dance club. He was screwing around and had put a dual 12 sealed sub box in all four corners of the room running off an amp, a set of CV old 15s on another amp, and a full HT system. I'm not sure if all of it was off one line or not, the HT system was on the conditioner I know.

Cell towers all operate on cabling with hollow conductors. I have a piece from a 150' tower for 1900Mhz, I can just get my pinky finger into the center and the outside is 1 5/8". It is foam filled to keep the center aligned. One dent can screw a cable up by impeding the surface flow of the center conductor. Since digital cell phones run on such low power, nearly anything can trash the signal to noise ratio. The size depends on frequency and length of run, some carriers use other sizes. A lot of things are strange in RF compared to normal electricity.


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## Z80_Man

briansz said:


> Not sure those matter much, but I could see a dedicated ground rod to lower ground resistance as an interesting possibility.


Well maybe they do all that (the gold plated breakers and so on ) thinkink it's efficient, while they actually did at least one : separating the grounds.

Ground loops or actually any resistance between the gound lines and the actual ground always have funny effects, the most obvious of all is ground lines behaving like an antenna, collecting all possible noise garbage in the area and driving them right into your amps ! 

I remember when I was a student, I could hear the radio in my speakers just by touching my vinyle turntable's diamond with my finger ! :laugh:

So the more you do to eliminate noise, the better. That's already the least you can do, while the golden plated bells and whistles are not likely to do much in comparison.

Bad grounding is actually the worse problem in a car audio setup. You really have to keep the ground cable as short as possible and find a really good grounding point in the car, or you'll be fighting noise forever !



briansz said:


> Is any of this audible in a vehicle? Who knows................


Hair cutting considerations about silver or copper signal cable ? Certainly not.

Ground cable length and thickness ? Certainly, yes ! :laugh:


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## Ludemandan

rape_ape said:


> Its what you meant by it that's what I found to be so stupid. What do you think it is that pulls a woofer cone backwards into the basket?


Nothing pushes the cone back into the basket. The suspension pulls it back when power is reduced. The movement of a cone is simply the motor pushing forward in the waveform of the music. If it's pushing backward, that would be due to reverse polarity.


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## chad

Z80_Man said:


> I remember when I was a student, I could hear the radio in my speakers just by touching my vinyle turntable's diamond with my finger ! :laugh:


I have a seperate, and elaborate RF/lightning/safety ground for my ham radio rig..... to prevent that from happening. Unless, of course, you are tuned to my broadcast freq incidentally.. then it's bad news man.

My son's computer speaker's cables liked to resonate RIGHT WHERE I did a nightly AM net... holy god it was ugly. Couple ferrite in the lines solved the issue quick but I spent a lot of time in trouble with a child.


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## Ludemandan

Ludemandan said:


> Nothing pushes the cone back into the basket. The suspension pulls it back when power is reduced. The movement of a cone is simply the motor pushing forward in the waveform of the music. If it's pushing backward, that would be due to reverse polarity.


Of course, I could be wrong. If I am, someone please chime in.


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## chad

Ludemandan said:


> Of course, I could be wrong. If I am, someone please chime in.


the cone tracks the output waveform, the suspension helps. Electrical damping, the amp actually pulls the cone back in. There is no commutator.


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## normalicy

Ludemandan said:


> Of course, I could be wrong. If I am, someone please chime in.


You are, the cone is pushed both ways by the speakers motor. The suspension only serves to keep the cone controlled & centered (well one could nit-pick on more stuff, but that's the basic idea).


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## Ludemandan

Well then... AC it is!


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## chad

damn straight.


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## Z80_Man

Ludemandan said:


> Nothing pushes the cone back into the basket. The suspension pulls it back when power is reduced. The movement of a cone is simply the motor pushing forward in the waveform of the music. If it's pushing backward, that would be due to reverse polarity.


Amplifiers have to use a symmetric power supply.

So inside the amp, a DC/DC converter powers up the original 12V, and a phantom ground is created so the output max voltage is split in half, with, yes, a negative power supply.

The output signal to the speakers is actually alternating from positive to negative as compared to an "idle" position from the speakers point of view, corresponding to the signal amplitude being at 0 V from the phantom ground (it actually occurs when the two wires carry the same voltage, whatever its value is measured from any reference. Remember voltage is electrical potential difference from a chosen reference "ground", it's not a absolute value).

So, yes, the speaker is actually pushed forward AND pulled backward, as polarity regularly reverts on the wires.

Don't be fooled by the fact that the negative power supply actually meets the vehicle ground (as it's generally the case). The output voltage doesn't use the car ground as a reference (that's why you should avoid shorting any output cable to the ground at all cost).


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## Ludemandan

Z80_Man said:


> Don't be fooled by the fact that the negative power supply actually meets the vehicle ground (as it's generally the case). The output voltage doesn't use the car ground as a reference (that's why you should avoid shorting any output cable to the ground at all cost).


So even though the RCA is grounded, the speaker negative is not. Got it, thanks.


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## chad

Z80_Man said:


> Amplifiers have to use a symmetric power supply.
> 
> So inside the amp, a DC/DC converter powers up the original 12V, and a phantom ground is created so the output max voltage is split in half, with, yes, a negative power supply.
> 
> The output signal to the speakers is actually alternating from positive to negative as compared to an "idle" position from the speakers point of view, corresponding to the signal amplitude being at 0 V from the phantom ground (it actually occurs when the two wires carry the same voltage, whatever its value is measured from any reference. Remember voltage is electrical potential difference from a chosen reference "ground", it's not a absolute value).
> 
> So, yes, the speaker is actually pushed forward AND pulled backward, as polarity regularly reverts on the wires.
> 
> Don't be fooled by the fact that the negative power supply actually meets the vehicle ground (as it's generally the case). The output voltage doesn't use the car ground as a reference (that's why you should avoid shorting any output cable to the ground at all cost).


This is a great explanation... and remember that phantom ground, drill it in, it will come back again, I promise.

Also keep in mind that said phantom ground is the same ground that references the low voltage preamp section, this ground is the ground that most amps (non differential input) have the shield tied to.

This isolation, in respect to the shields of other processing in-between, is often times where ground loops come from.


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## chad

this is sooo 2005/6 DejaVu


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## sqshoestring

Z80_Man said:


> ......
> 
> Don't be fooled by the fact that the negative power supply actually meets the vehicle ground (as it's generally the case). The output voltage doesn't use the car ground as a reference (that's why you should avoid shorting any output cable to the ground at all cost).


If you mean the negative rail is vehicle ground, well only in an amp with no negative rail such as a 12v amp in a HU. It would take half the voltage say 6v for a common ground and 12v pos rail and 0v neg rail. Some class D car amps do this and have 75V positive rail only, so half that is the common and 0v is 'negative rail', (to the speakers anyway). But most typical car amps do have positive and negative rails and the common is at or close to vehicle ground. At rest there is no voltage on the outputs that way. Many connect the common to ground with a resistor so it is close to vehicle ground. Different amps do different things with the shields, but it is not connected directly to the common of the power supply to create a ground loop just like Chad says ("references" is the correct term).

Right X voltage is applied to the speaker positive or negative to move it. The speaker does not care if you put 1,020 volts on negative and 1,030 volts on positive, it will move the cone out 10v worth just like 0 and 10v would.


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## chad

birds on a wire.


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## Oliver

raamaudio said:


> ... of the best they tested they came to the conclusion it could never be heard in a system. But, those that owned the pure silver stuff still used it because it was part of showing off how much they spent and they already had it anyway which we all know is a huge part of the crazy prices people will pay for sometimes pretty goofy stuff, much snake oil in high end audio.
> 
> Rick


*If you can't hear a difference that is night and day, it don't matter!*


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## Ludemandan

chad said:


> This is a great explanation... and remember that phantom ground, drill it in, it will come back again, I promise.
> 
> Also keep in mind that said phantom ground is the same ground that references the low voltage preamp section, this ground is the ground that most amps (non differential input) have the shield tied to.
> 
> This isolation, in respect to the shields of other processing in-between, is often times where ground loops come from.


So you're saying that the RCA ground is different from chassis ground? In the system in my garage, I have the RCA shields grounded to the power supply negative. The noise floor is reduced when this connection is made.


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## chad

In most modern amps, yes, the chassis ground is isolated from the input ground, on headunits, no. not as common.

In the amps the shield is hitting the center tap of the transformer, which is certainly isolated. Some amps have differential inputs, completely different story but adapt to work the same in a good manner.


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## Oliver

Ground loop (electricity) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia




> Floating ground - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
> A floating ground circuit is a circuit in which the ground is not used as a fixed reference, rather, it is a common node in the circuit. ...


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## 3fish

Sarthos said:


> There is only one advantage I will concede with aluminum wire.
> 
> Current traveling through a wire is like fluid traveling through a pipe. More area=less pressure=slower flow. The smaller diameter of pipe you use, the faster fluid will flow (which is why oversized intakes on cars can result in lost horsepower, incoming air velocity is too slow). With wire, the smaller the diameter the faster the current travels. So a silver wire will have the same conductivity as copper wire but a smaller diameter, resulting in faster movement of current. Not sure how that might really help, but that's the case.


Hey Tspence, welcome back!


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## Oliver

Sarthos said:


> There is only one advantage I will concede with aluminum wire.
> 
> Current traveling through a wire is like fluid traveling through a pipe. More area=less pressure=slower flow. The smaller diameter of pipe you use, the faster fluid will flow (*which is why oversized intakes on cars can result in lost horsepower*, incoming air velocity is too slow). With wire, the smaller the diameter the faster the current travels. So a silver wire will have the same conductivity as copper wire but a smaller diameter, resulting in faster movement of current. Not sure how that might really help, but that's the case.





> l Electrical Conductivity
> 
> (S·m-1)
> Notes
> Silver 6.30 × 107 Best electrical conductor of any known metal
> Copper 5.69 × 107 Commonly used in electrical wire applications due to very good conductivity and price compared to silver.



*Not when it's floored *


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## raamaudio

Exactly, not even night and day, I would consider costly cables if there was a reasonable iMprovement in the sound but if barely measurable on the best test gear made then our ears are not likely to hear it either. 

I love knowing my Star Quad cables are about as good as the best in actual use and dirt cheap to make though I wish easier to make since I have made at least 100 pairs over the years. 

I also use welding cable for power wires and something like Wire King for speaker wires or even cheaper. I have never had an issue with any of these lower cost products and use them no matter how expensive the system. I use marine grade heat shrink on anything that can get moisture near it and regular on other areas. 

Rick


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## Silver Supra

Not to throw gasoline on this fire, but I review home audio gear and because of that have had just about every type of cable come through my system... to my ear there are differences. 

As an EE it makes absolutely no sense to me I'm just telling you what my ears/brain tells me. 

I used Audio Magic cables (which are silver) for quite some time and absolutely hated them at first, as they were VERY aggressive and drove me out of the room. Over time they mellowed and do seem to be more transparent in the upper frequencies than most Copper cables.

Again, cable break-in is another phenomenon which makes no sense to me and I can just as easily believe it's my ear adjusting to the cable as it is the cable changing... so I'll leave it at that.

Power cables also make a difference too but I won't even go there... 

Here is an interesting article on the subject if you are interested.

http://www.soundstage.com/yfiles/yfiles200005.htm


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## Z80_Man

Silver Supra said:


> I used Audio Magic cables (which are silver) for quite some time and absolutely hated them at first, as they were VERY aggressive and drove me out of the room. Over time they mellowed




Excuse me, but this really sounds magic to me !

Don't you think your ears just got used to a somewhat more harsh sound (provided there is a difference) ? Maybe they were even aggressed so hard you actually lost a bit of your audition...




Silver Supra said:


> and do seem to be more transparent in the upper frequencies than most Copper cables.


Well, I'd say this is what we should expect, provided the difference can be heard.

But more transparent high frequencies, yet sometimes a more harsh sound as you described, are more often attributed to tweeters than to the cables ! 

Titanium dome tweeters are generally rennowned for that.


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## Ludemandan

Z80_Man said:


> Excuse me, but this really sounds magic to me !
> 
> Don't you think your ears just got used to a somewhat more harsh sound (provided there is a difference) ? Maybe they were even aggressed so hard you actually lost a bit of your audition...


If you read the soundstage article he posted, it explains how this could be true. It's pretty long though.


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## Z80_Man

Ludemandan said:


> If you read the soundstage article he posted, it explains how this could be true. It's pretty long though.


Mellowing over time ? Cables ?

OK, I'll read, of course : I can't judge without knowing.

I'm still very skeptical, though...


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## coyote-1

Have you double-blind tested these things? It's really the only way to eliminate such factors as *confirmation bias*, which tells those spending a fortune on wire that it must be worthwhile.

Believe it or not, I once got into an argument with someone about the merits of such testing. The guy said (paraphrase but accurate), completely seriously: "If I don't know what brand I'm hearing, how can I know whether to like it or not?" :lol:


Silver Supra said:


> Not to throw gasoline on this fire, but I review home audio gear and because of that have had just about every type of cable come through my system... to my ear there are differences.
> 
> As an EE it makes absolutely no sense to me I'm just telling you what my ears/brain tells me.
> 
> I used Audio Magic cables (which are silver) for quite some time and absolutely hated them at first, as they were VERY aggressive and drove me out of the room. Over time they mellowed and do seem to be more transparent in the upper frequencies than most Copper cables.
> 
> Again, cable break-in is another phenomenon which makes no sense to me and I can just as easily believe it's my ear adjusting to the cable as it is the cable changing... so I'll leave it at that.
> 
> Power cables also make a difference too but I won't even go there...
> 
> Here is an interesting article on the subject if you are interested.
> 
> SoundStage! The Y-Files - EAResponsible Wiring (5/2000)


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## soloz2

Silver is a fantastic conductor and when implemented properly in an interconnect it absolutely is superior to copper. But the difference is subtle and I wouldn't spend that much on a mobile system. Home, in a heartbeat as long as the rest of the system can support it. IMHO


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## Z80_Man

soloz2 said:


> Silver is a fantastic conductor and when implemented properly in an interconnect it absolutely is superior to copper. But the difference is subtle and I wouldn't spend that much on a mobile system. Home, in a heartbeat as long as the rest of the system can support it. IMHO


It's my opinion too.

Car audio environment is globally too noisy to hear such subtle differences, especially when driving... It's a car, not a living-room ! 

I'm still wondering how "cable sound" can mellow with time, though... :laugh:

But I won't say anything more before having read the article... Though I've too much work now to have time to read that right now.


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## gijoe

soloz2 said:


> Silver is a fantastic conductor and when implemented properly in an interconnect it absolutely is superior to copper. But the difference is subtle and I wouldn't spend that much on a mobile system. Home, in a heartbeat as long as the rest of the system can support it. IMHO


This sub-forum is about discussing myths and separating fact from fiction. Because of that I'm curious how you can justify these statements. Most of us know that silver is a superior conductor than copper, but can you tell us how that equals better sound? The only difference that the conductivity has in the signal is with regards to resistance. If a copper wire is the appropriate size there will be no difference in resistance to a silver wire. There has to be a certain amount of resistance to cause a voltage drop significant enough to be audible and in the case of an audio signal I can't see this being a problem. 

The term "double blind" will be used a lot in this sub-forum, as will requests for data or evidence. We are trying to determine what is true vs. what is marketing, and so far the believers in silver wire have not contributed any convincing evidence to show that it can possibly sound better. In the spirit of this website, can you please provide something other than subjective information to this topic?


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## soloz2

gijoe said:


> This sub-forum is about discussing myths and separating fact from fiction. Because of that I'm curious how you can justify these statements. Most of us know that silver is a superior conductor than copper, but can you tell us how that equals better sound? The only difference that the conductivity has in the signal is with regards to resistance. If a copper wire is the appropriate size there will be no difference in resistance to a silver wire. There has to be a certain amount of resistance to cause a voltage drop significant enough to be audible and in the case of an audio signal I can't see this being a problem.
> 
> The term "double blind" will be used a lot in this sub-forum, as will requests for data or evidence. We are trying to determine what is true vs. what is marketing, and so far the believers in silver wire have not contributed any convincing evidence to show that it can possibly sound better. In the spirit of this website, can you please provide something other than subjective information to this topic?


People looking for double blind tests etc. are most often the ones who won't believe anything unless they can see hard indisputable proof. Unfortunately, sound quality is subjective. What this means is that what one person can clearly hear and be able to reliably pick in a true double blind test another may not. In this situation the best we can do participate in a double blind test ourselves to see if we (you or I) can determine a difference. If we can't then we can't, nothing to be ashamed of; but that also doesn't give us the right to bash those that can tell a difference and the opposite is true as well.

I don't have a test that will prove my thoughts on the matter without a doubt to any and all so best not go down that route... we'll go round and round.

Have I participated in blind tests, yes. Have I A/B'd equipment knowing which was which, yes. Have I experimented with different conductor material and construction of interconnects, yes. Have I experimented with different plugs, you betcha! In the end I have come to the conclusion that not only does conductor quality and type make a difference but so does construction. I can hear differences between cables, I don't think less of anyone who can't.


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## raamaudio

The thing that gets me in threads like this is the fact that some tend to think everything is already figured out. Though it would seem we are no longer in the dark ages we certainly do not know all there is to know, we do not even know where to look yet.....

Some people may be able to sense things others do not that we have not invented machines to test it or the methods to verify whether somebody can perceive things others are not sensitive enough to observe. 

Isn't our best guess at the moment everything is pure energy? Maybe we have not found about all forms of just yet.

I obviously I have an open mind about such things, at 58 I have been through some pretty interesting changes in this world we share

Rick


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## Z80_Man

Just a thought...

Cables lengths in a car are commonly between 3 to 5 m (10 to 16 feet) ; I doubt it would be enough for conductivity differences betwen copper and silver to be heard, but you're right to remind us about cable construction : these lengths are far enough to produce unwanted capacitance, and its effects on the higher frequencies are obvious.

I think the first criteria to look for would be a large separation between the two wires.

Now you remind me something I've read about a very high end home audio setup : the guy used very ordinary electrical wire, but separated the + and - wires by 10 cm (4 inches) using spacers (they finally looked much like railway tracks !  ) and said the difference in comparison with classical parallel stuck cables was tremendous.

Now if you look at large section cable people generally use to replace the factory thin cable in car audio setups, you can notice the wires are spaced farther in the process, as the insulation gest thickier at the same time, and it can help already ; even higher end audio cables are flat, as the wires are widely separated (though they never are up to 4" !  ) : maybe they are worth testing, as just using silver instead should probably be far less effective than those different constructions.


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## Thoraudio

Any thing that will affect the electrical output of the wire will be evident the RCL measurements of the wire.

and the RCL measurements of the wire (w/out the stupid passive eq boxes that some 'high end' companies add) will be tiny compared to the numbers you get from the physical connections that litter the electrical path. 

amp board to connector, connector to wire, wire to banana connector, banana connector to cabinet connectors (on a home system), cab connectors to wire, wire to xover, various caps and coils soldered to a board, xover to wire, wire to speaker connectors, speaker connectors to tinsel leads (almost always braided copper), tinsel leads to vc (almost always solid copper). 

Speaker wire is the least of these.... power wire even less so.


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## tornaido_3927

soloz2 said:


> People looking for double blind tests etc. are most often the ones who won't believe anything unless they can see hard indisputable proof. Unfortunately, sound quality is subjective. What this means is that what one person can clearly hear and be able to reliably pick in a true double blind test another may not. In this situation the best we can do participate in a double blind test ourselves to see if we (you or I) can determine a difference. If we can't then we can't, nothing to be ashamed of; but that also doesn't give us the right to bash those that can tell a difference and the opposite is true as well.
> 
> I don't have a test that will prove my thoughts on the matter without a doubt to any and all so best not go down that route... we'll go round and round.
> 
> Have I participated in blind tests, yes. Have I A/B'd equipment knowing which was which, yes. Have I experimented with different conductor material and construction of interconnects, yes. Have I experimented with different plugs, you betcha! In the end I have come to the conclusion that not only does conductor quality and type make a difference but so does construction. I can hear differences between cables, I don't think less of anyone who can't.


I tend to think that people want proof because the wires are carrying an electrical signal. That is ALL that they do, and because of that, if they altered the sound that the speaker emits then the change would be evident in the signal, therefore it would be measurable.


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## Ludemandan

I'm sure there are things that are measurable but not audible. I have no doubt that even subtle changes between wires would be measurable in a lab. I think the question is, how big a change is audible. Point being, you can't prove a change is audible just because it is measurable.


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## raamaudio

May or may not be true, there may be more going on than just carrying an electrical signal, there are no absolutes, we like to think they are so we feel we are in control, on top of things, etc.......

I am not saying I believe there is more going on than we now know, just saying it certainly could be so but we do not know how to quantify it yet but it does not mean it might not exist.

---------

About cable and wire material, construction, etc...... back in 1982/83 I met a very good audio engineer that showed me a set of cables he made from 3 different gauges of motor winding wire. I forgot the exact makeup but it was braided with different numbers of wire per gauge. The ends he used were very simple RCA connectors that just had a ground tab and center pin with what looked like circuit board material keeping the center pin from touching the sheild(return) 

The braid was done to a pretty exact number per inch, not to tight but not loose either. 

The theory was the closer the wires were to each other and being braided canceled out an capacitance. 

They were far to delicate for mobile application but I sure loved the set I made for my old rebuilt Dynaco Stereo 70 and 3 way Dynaudio DIY speakers, DIY equalized phono cartridge. 

Instead of having the wires far apart he wanted them as close as possible, the varnish on the wires being the only insulator. 

Just posting something from my past I found interesting

Rick


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## tornaido_3927

Ludemandan said:


> I'm sure there are things that are measurable but not audible. I have no doubt that even subtle changes between wires would be measurable in a lab. I think the question is, how big a change is audible. Point being, *you can't prove a change is audible just because it is measurable.*


That's not my point, I'm merely just stating why people like to have concrete evidence of why people think they can hear a change, rather than just saying that they can hear it but others can not.



raamaudio said:


> About cable and wire material, construction, etc...... back in 1982/83 I met a very good audio engineer that showed me a set of cables he made from 3 different gauges of motor winding wire. I forgot the exact makeup but it was braided with different numbers of wire per gauge. The ends he used were very simple RCA connectors that just had a ground tab and center pin with what looked like circuit board material keeping the center pin from touching the sheild(return)
> 
> The braid was done to a pretty exact number per inch, not to tight but not loose either.
> 
> The theory was the closer the wires were to each other and being braided canceled out an capacitance.
> 
> They were far to delicate for mobile application but I sure loved the set I made for my old rebuilt Dynaco Stereo 70 and 3 way Dynaudio DIY speakers, DIY equalized phono cartridge.
> 
> Instead of having the wires far apart he wanted them as close as possible, the varnish on the wires being the only insulator.
> 
> Just posting something from my past I found interesting
> 
> Rick


What gains did he/you get from those delicate wires though?


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## The Baron Groog

raamaudio said:


> May or may not be true, there may be more going on than just carrying an electrical signal, there are no absolutes, we like to think they are so we feel we are in control, on top of things, etc.......
> 
> I am not saying I believe there is more going on than we now know, just saying it certainly could be so but we do not know how to quantify it yet but it does not mean it might not exist.
> 
> ---------
> 
> About cable and wire material, construction, etc...... back in 1982/83 I met a very good audio engineer that showed me a set of cables he made from 3 different gauges of motor winding wire. I forgot the exact makeup but it was braided with different numbers of wire per gauge. The ends he used were very simple RCA connectors that just had a ground tab and center pin with what looked like circuit board material keeping the center pin from touching the sheild(return)
> 
> The braid was done to a pretty exact number per inch, not to tight but not loose either.
> 
> The theory was the closer the wires were to each other and being braided canceled out an capacitance.
> 
> They were far to delicate for mobile application but I sure loved the set I made for my old rebuilt Dynaco Stereo 70 and 3 way Dynaudio DIY speakers, DIY equalized phono cartridge.
> 
> Instead of having the wires far apart he wanted them as close as possible, the varnish on the wires being the only insulator.
> 
> Just posting something from my past I found interesting
> 
> Rick


I've seen cars wired like this, using conventional cable-the point of the braid was to cross the wires so any inductance is cancelled out:

Twisted pair cables


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## Z80_Man

Yes, it's used to balance the signal where long cables and high frequencies are needed (such as network cables).


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## The Baron Groog

Any cable will induce current in another if parallel to it and close enough-ever accidentally run your mains cable over speaker wire and noticed the 50Hz hum? (UK voltage is 50Hz 240v)

While speaker cable runs at lower voltages/ampages any induced noise should be considered.


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## chad

The Baron Groog said:


> Any cable will induce current in another if parallel to it and close enough-ever accidentally run your mains cable over speaker wire and noticed the 50Hz hum? (UK voltage is 50Hz 240v)
> 
> While speaker cable runs at lower voltages/ampages any induced noise should be considered.


Not gonna happen, impedances are far too low in that situation.


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## Jaredturp

Lots of interesting reading in this thread. Thanks for posting.


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## Sarthos

> While speaker cable runs at lower voltages/ampages any induced noise should be considered.


Wrong. Speaker cables run at lower voltage, higher amperage than household equipment. And voltage isn't what matters for inducing currents in other wires, it's current that matters. Think about it, the biggest appliances in a 120 volt house use about 10 amps of current. Most 240 volt appliances draw less than 5 amps. Now, run a subwoofer with 400 watts at 1 ohm, and you have 20 amps of current. Run a 4 ohm speaker with 150 watts, it's still 6 amps of current. So speaker wire can be very effective in inducing current in nearby wires. Do you know why you don't notice it though? It induces a current which is very closely in phase with the other current.


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## Ludemandan

Twisted pairing only reduces noise on balanced signals, not RCAs or speaker wires. Also, it should not reduce self-inductance. Spacing should reduce both self-inductance and capacitance.


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## Sarthos

Isn't solid wire the best for reducing inductance and capacitance?


----------



## The Baron Groog

chad said:


> Not gonna happen, impedances are far too low in that situation.


*
I've heard it with my dad's old panasonic set (circa 1975)*



Sarthos said:


> Wrong. Speaker cables run at lower voltage, higher amperage than household equipment. And voltage isn't what matters for inducing currents in other wires, it's current that matters. Think about it, the biggest appliances in a 120 volt house use about 10 amps of current. Most 240 volt appliances draw less than 5 amps. Now, run a subwoofer with 400 watts at 1 ohm, and you have 20 amps of current. Run a 4 ohm speaker with 150 watts, it's still 6 amps of current. So speaker wire can be very effective in inducing current in nearby wires. Do you know why you don't notice it though? It induces a current which is very closely in phase with the other current.


*I don't profess to be an expert but you say I'm wrong then agree 5amps is near enough 6amps, subwoofer cables are the least likely to cause issue as the cable run is normally short and not down the sills/bundled with other cables so not really relevant.

If you're running active then your mids and tweeters are playing different freqs so any induced noise could be apparent in the other driver's output? 

Wouldn't induced noise "in phase" with the signal in the 2nd cable then re-inforce the 2nd cables signal same way two speakers in phase create positive re-inforcement?*


----------



## Sarthos

Yes, 5 amps is near 6 amps. But as I said, 5 amps is about the max in a 240 volt house... that's what a microwave draws when it's on. Subwoofers often draw 10 or more amps continuously.

Little known fact. If you're running signal in anyway such that not all wires carry the same signal, they should be separated if you want the absolute best sound. Mostly for home theater applications with no noise floor.
Also, this is where your ears will deceive you. The wires will indeed induce a small amount of current going to the wrong drivers. The drivers will then put out said signal. But because the signal is already being played through one driver, it won't sound out of place. The 50 hz signal in your house is in phase with nothing in your system, that's why it is more noticeable.

Yes and no. It will reinforce the signal, but the inductance increases impedance which results in less signal, so your overall signal is still weaker.


----------



## Ludemandan

In a 120/240V house though, like in the US, outlets can draw up to 11 amps.


----------



## Sarthos

Yes, up to 11 amps... do you happen to be running your microwave, toaster, and hairdryer off the same outlet at the same time? If not you won't be drawing 11 amps on 240 volts


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## Ludemandan

Not at 240, but at 120. There are single appliances that draw 11A at 120V. But they usually make noise, so it's kind of a moot point.


----------



## chad

I've had super long runs of 70.7V speaker actually get a chunk of conduit "ringing" electrically so bad that it set up a resonance in the neighboring conduit carrying signal lines. Mind you this was going across a football stadium but it sure was a hell of a mess. We ended up using plastic bushings to break the conduit into segments so it would not resonate.


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## arw01

Ludemandan said:


> In a 120/240V house though, like in the US, outlets can draw up to 11 amps.


Hugh?

Your breakers are likely 20 amp, the wiring will likely be 14 gauge romex. The outlets without the -| outlet are rated at 15 amps.

A hair dryer or 120v heater can pull 1500 watts pretty easy. Watts = amps*volts


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## Ludemandan

Well, there are some 15A breakers. A 15A breaker would trip at 80% of its rating under continuous duty, which is 12A. A 20A breaker will allow 16A continuous current.

This is getting pretty far off topic for car audio.


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## WLDock

Ludemandan said:


> ...Paired wires like audio interconnects are subject to capacitance and inductance, and the thing that affects resistance (wire size and ohms per foot) doesn't affect capacitance and inductance. I don't know how much they affect audio quality, but the folks at MIT cables have lots of literature explaining why it does (and why their products correct for these effects). MIT Cables Technical / Whitepapers | Articles | Publications


Let's say all the above were true.......Their products are still ridiculously expensive.


----------



## Oh.humes

Yes, it's used to balance the signal where long cables and high frequencies are needed (such as network cables).


----------



## chad

Oh.humes said:


> Yes, it's used to balance the signal where long cables and high frequencies are needed (such as network cables).


----------



## Hillbilly SQ

I made my soundstage jump out 100' past the hood and 50' to each side by using coathangers braided around weedeater line for speakerwire. Give it a try and you'll be a believer too


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## Huckleberry Sound

I just read through all this. I saw one website called Monoprice.com. There stuff is priced at GREAT price points. They carry all Gold products. Are there any other website with great price with silver products. And will it really matter?

Thanks


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## arw01

You have to listen to it and decide yourself.

In my younger years I did hear the difference in audio connects from the absolute crap ones to the $1.00 a foot flex connect II from Audio Quest. I COULD NOT hear a difference between the $1.00 a foot and the more expensive stuff. I detected a subtle difference on the highest frequencies.

Audiophile magazine tested SPEAKER wire against coat hangers and found their subjects could not tell the difference.

I think the inter-connects is the last frontier that has not been completely answered.


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## Ludemandan

Huckleberry Sound said:


> I just read through all this. I saw one website called Monoprice.com. There stuff is priced at GREAT price points. They carry all Gold products. Are there any other website with great price with silver products. And will it really matter?
> 
> Thanks


Correction, they carry gold plated products, which are common and cheap. And they don't have any silver speaker wire. The topic is about stuff like this:
https://www.madisound.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=8978


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## Jaredturp

Any links to people that actually sell silver wire?


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## Ludemandan

Jaredturp said:


> Any links to people that actually sell silver wire?


Yes, see above.


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## Z80_Man

Silver can actually oxydate the same way as copper (bright blue oxyde).

Using gold says a good idea for contacts, as sparks may oxydate the metals involved quickly. It's so widely used because it doesn't oxydate at all, though copper and siver's conduction is better.

The best way to use copper or silver wire is then to solder the cables when you can.



Edit : wow, I just had a look to this Goertz silver cable... Nice layout, but... $716.56 per foot ???   

Better put my money elsewhere !


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## t3sn4f2

Silver oxide is conductive unlike copper, IIRC. Not advocating silver over copper or tinned copper in any way though, just saying.


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## Huckleberry Sound

Ok here is my question. I just had a thought. What is I purchased a decent spool of speaker wire and connectors. Can I use it to make my speaker wire and rca cables. If that is the case, do you recommend a speaker wire for this. I dont mind making my own cables. It would be fun and worth the experience. 

Thanks for all the incite...


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## Ludemandan

You wouldn't want to use speaker wire to make RCAs, you'd want to use a coaxial cable like RG-59. But yes. http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/how-articles-provided-our-members/8158-making-rca-cables.html


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## t3sn4f2

This is all you need, anything more expensive will not improve audio performance what so ever.

Gepco International, Inc. -- Audio and Video Cable Products --


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## Huckleberry Sound

Thanks I appreciate it. I will read over the tutorial and see what it would take. I apprecaite it very much.

Do you think home theather speaker wire is better than car audio wire?


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## t3sn4f2

Huckleberry Sound said:


> Thanks I appreciate it. I will read over the tutorial and see what it would take. I apprecaite it very much.
> 
> *Do you think home theather speaker wire is better than car audio wire?*


No.

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/how-articles-provided-our-members/7517-science-cables.html

Believe that.

Werewolf=Lycan


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## WLDock

Wolf's Science of Cables was good. I think the main things needed for a good car audio cable are ruggedness and some noise rejection. A silver coated copper interconnect is icing on the cake and not a bad thing if they don't cost hundereds of dollars a set.

IMO, a cable like the old MTX ThunderLink Expert RCA's were the epitome of a good car audio cable. It was simply a cable that address a lot of issues and did not cost an arm and a leg. The cable was "just right" ...not too cheesy but not too over the top. I am not sure how they affect *R-L-C* but I would not want anything cheaper with less features nor would I want anything more expensive with more features....the cable are just right for car audio use.

_


MTX CAR AUDIO said:



*MTX ThunderLink Expert *- The Elegant Expert








With a very high-gloss, elegant look, the Expert is the best cable choice if you want absolute lowest noise possible. The connectors are machined on a CNC lathe, chromed, and then plated with 24-karat gold. We did this for two reasons; first, you get a very durable connector Second, they look sano. Clean. Sweet.

*Skin Effect = High Fidelity*








This cross-section diagram of a single strand of wire shows the Expert’s silver coating. Silver is a superior conductor. We use it as the coating, because the higher frequencies travel close to the surface of the cable (this is a phenomenon called “skin effect”). This makes the Expert Interconnects the best choice where the maximum degree of high fidelity is expected. (Like in the Sound Quality Plus competition at the IASCA finals, for example.) 









• Silver-coated, OFC copper stranding
• “Twisted Twins” (twisted, twisted pair RCA cable) 
• 7 mm of black pvc, with a clear overlay jacketing 
• Chrome and gold-plated ergonomically designed RCA plugs 
• 24-karat gold-plated split center pin (for a better connection) 
• 24-karat goldplated six-segment outer conductor rings (for the tightest fit) 
• Dual strain relief (machined end with polyethylene innermold) 
• Teflon dielectric 

MTX Car Audio - ThunderLink Expert

Click to expand...

_Again, I don' t know how all this affects R-L-C but this RCA addressed all one would want in the car. I really don't see a need to use anything more.


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## Huckleberry Sound

Ok I just checked E-bay for this product and there is none to be found. For this first round of my install. I am going to go with Stinger Electronics over Streetwire. Right now I find Streetwire products to be far more expensive. Plus a local deal in my area cares Stinger Products, so I might be able to get some good local deals.


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## Ludemandan

This thread is about speaker wire. Interconnects are totally different, they are grounded, coaxial, shielded and subject to interference from external sources. Speaker wires are ungrounded, unshielded because they are not subject to external EMF, but they are more prone to self-capacitance and inductance. That is why the Goertz wires are flat. They are speaker wires, not for RCA use.


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## WLDock

Ludemandan said:


> This thread is about speaker wire. Interconnects are totally different, they are grounded, coaxial, shielded and subject to interference from external sources. Speaker wires are ungrounded, unshielded because they are not subject to external EMF, but they are more prone to self-capacitance and inductance. That is why the Goertz wires are flat. They are speaker wires, not for RCA use.


Well, this thread has bounced around many ideas about speaker, RCA, and power wire. The Goertz theory is interesting:

_



*WHY CHOOSE GOERTZ CABLES?*

*You can Hear the difference with Goertz Cables*

Goertz cables have the lowest inductance to match the impedance of your loudspeakers.

Virtually eliminates high frequency roll off, skin effect, and emitted EMI/RFI.

Offers virtually zero distortion even with the longest cable runs. 

By using Goertz cables, the signal appearing at the terminals on your loudspeakers is almost identical to the signal that left your amplifier.

Virtually eliminates hum caused by adjacent power wiring, crosstalk between channels, and microphony from 
strand interaction.Simply put, if you connect your components through conventional speaker wire, you'll never 
hear the sound quality that you paid for.

While the signal leaving your amplifier may be as distortion-free as modern electronics technology allows, 
the signal arriving at your loudspeakers is often thirty years obsolete.

Click to expand...

_And they offer a twisted speaker cable in their PYTHON Series:



> Python MI2, the first Serpent, is electrically and sonically equivalent with our most popular GOERTZ MI2. It contains four film insulated flat, solid OFC copper conductors sandwiched intimately on top of one another and then twisted and embedded in a cylindrical, solid jacket of high grade polymer. The resin is cast in place to totally support and protect the flat conductor bundle, meaning that Python can take any amount of punishment and still sound and look like new.
> 
> The newcomers are true low inductance cables just like our original GOERTZ brand, but the twist enhances noise rejection even further to effectively prevent RF and EM interference from entering the feed-back loop.


I guess Goertz thinks speaker wire is affected by RF and EMI and they offer Silver Interconnects as well. I guess it comes down to what theory one believes and what ones' ears can hear. This one is never ending....

So....what is this thread about again?


----------



## Hillbilly SQ

Now that we're talking rca cables when I went from 4 shorter cables spliced together with ratshack connectors after I did away with the linedriver to a Stinger Expert Series 4ch cable I had to retune my truck. Something was messing with my phasing. Think the cheap cables and phono connectors where the linedriver was has something to do with it? There were other things that changed in the sound but just needed a nudge here and there to get right again. The phasing was the only thing completely jacked from the cable change.

Also, one time I switched from cheap wire from Walmart to Monster speakerwire with the voodoo flux core in the middle. Everything sounded a lot more refined with the change. My guess is I couldn't keep the walmart wire from corroding so it degraded the sound enough to notice. It even turned green inside the jacket. Here in the deep south if you aren't used to the humidity it can feel like you're trying to breathe under water. Now when I wire a new truck I use cable that I can install and forget it. Then I'll usually just trade the truck in with the old speakerwire and sometimes the rca's still in it. Powerwire slides out too easy not to keep it and it's ultra high quality 4g copper with tough jacket.


----------



## Oliver

This guy is a believer --



> Whether it's copper or silver, if you do take the 6 gauge route, don't bother with spades or other connectors. One of the five ways a five-way binding post works is the hole in the center. Just insert the bare bundle and tighten. Since the conductive properties of silver are substantially higher than those of copper, an 8 AWG silver conductor will closely approximate the transmission properties of 6 AWG copper. However, given the cost and malleability of solid silver wire, 10AWG may be as large a gauge as one really needs to use.
> 
> In December, 2009, I continued the trials by comparing 30 gauge wire with 24 as a phono to preamp interconnect and preferred the 30 gauge. Though the difference was subtle, it seemed to open up the sound stage a bit more, as well as lift a very faint veil, bringing me closer to the performers. By comparison, with a digital front-end, the 24 gauge seemed to have the edge over 30 in bass performance.
> 
> In the summer of 2010, I fabricated a pair of 1 meter, hybrid interconnects for a client in Europe in which the positive (+) conductor was made from extra soft 24K gold wire and the return (-) conductor from extra soft silver. Since I knew that gold was not as good a conductor as silver (it's measurably true) and had heard that it tended to make the music sound a bit slower, I wasn't expecting much from this expensive experiment. However, I was truly surprised to hear noticeably less grain through the gold-silver hybrid pair. The sound was clearly more fluid and analog sounding, in a way that only live music can be. Although they seemed to shift the spectrum down a notch, the highs did not really suffer—in fact, they sounded even smoother—nor did the speed of the music. The benefits, at least on LPs, were all positive. Results varied from record to record and your equipment may tell a different story, *but now I use them as my personal vinyl reference.*


The highs get higher and the mids seem middier


----------



## Z80_Man

RCA cable drive low voltage, low current, high impedance signals and are very, very sensitive to ground loops and any induced interference.

Paying attention to good quality and properly shielded cable, and driving them away from the cars' (and your amps') power lines or signal cables (such as the indicators' ones) is essential.

Your hardware will be more or less able to reject electrical noises, too.

I had all sort of equipment in my life, and I remember an active crossover that produced a lot of noise by itself and catched all the other electric noises in the area... And on the other hand, my Alpine source and Audison amps are silent as a tomb. Maybe it's my double-shielded, twisted-pair RCAs, that I drove through the central tunnel to avoid to travel along all the other wire harnesses ? Or just the Alpine ? Or the 3 at the same time ?

Who knows ? But it's perfect, now.


----------



## Silver Supra

Z80_Man said:


> Excuse me, but this really sounds magic to me !
> 
> Don't you think your ears just got used to a somewhat more harsh sound (provided there is a difference) ? Maybe they were even aggressed so hard you actually lost a bit of your audition...
> 
> 
> 
> Well, I'd say this is what we should expect, provided the difference can be heard.
> 
> But more transparent high frequencies, yet sometimes a more harsh sound as you described, are more often attributed to tweeters than to the cables !
> 
> Titanium dome tweeters are generally rennowned for that.


Maybe it was my ears adjusting... but in order to adjust didn't it mean that there was a difference to adjust to? I'm not arguing with anyone as it's hocus pocus to me too. I can only assume that the cables are designed in such a way to create subtle RLC circuits in order to manipulate the signals.

Physical properties of the materials are what they are however.

My Titanium domes are very smooth... Aerial Acoustics does not do harsh!


----------



## Z80_Man

Silver Supra said:


> My Titanium domes are very smooth... Aerial Acoustics does not do harsh!


Brand noted, thanks.


----------



## chad

Z80_Man said:


> Paying attention to good quality and properly shielded cable, and driving them away from the cars' (and your amps') power lines or signal cables (such as the indicators' ones) is essential.





Z80_Man said:


> and driving them away from the cars' power lines or signal cables


Bears repeating, part of it twice


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## thehatedguy

Doesn't matter if they are separated from the power wire or not.

Electrons don't flow from the battery to the amp. They flow from the ground to the battery. Any noise coming down the power wire will be equal in the ground plane of the car. And in a car there is NO way to completely isolate any cables from resting near the ground plane in a car since the whole damn car is a ground plane.


----------



## Jaredturp

thehatedguy said:


> Doesn't matter if they are separated from the power wire or not.
> 
> Electrons don't flow from the battery to the amp. They flow from the ground to the battery. Any noise coming down the power wire will be equal in the ground plane of the car. And in a car there is NO way to completely isolate any cables from resting near the ground plane in a car since the whole damn car is a ground plane.


I'm not sure if this agrees or disagrees with what you said, but my knowledge about batteries and grounds and such is as follows.... Electrons follow the entire path from the cathode to the anode. The separated redox reactants in a lead-acid battery want to transfer electrons. They flow through the power wire, the amp, and the ground wire. The PbO and the Pb are separated by an electrolyte that does not allow the transfer of all ions, so the electrons follow the path through the wires attached to your amp. *Is all of that correct?* So the ground and the power would have the exact same problems.


----------



## Z80_Man

thehatedguy said:


> Doesn't matter if they are separated from the power wire or not.
> 
> Electrons don't flow from the battery to the amp. They flow from the ground to the battery. Any noise coming down the power wire will be equal in the ground plane of the car. And in a car there is NO way to completely isolate any cables from resting near the ground plane in a car since the whole damn car is a ground plane.


We're not talking about electrons here, we're talking about induction of other signals travelling along the lines.

The longer different cables travel in parallel, the more they influence each other.

If the power lines drove idle, flat, absolutely continuous current, if wouldn't really be a problem here (they could still induce a continuous offset, easily removed by the amp's entrances filtering capacitors), but they actually carry a lot of noise.

Anyway, it's a real problem for low current and high impedance RCA lines, where the noise level is similar to the signal level, but very unlikely to produce effects you'd be able to hear when it comes to the speakers lines. At least, it can be neglected in a car, which is a noisy environment by itself.

BTW, you generally put shorter speakers wires in a car than in a house (no more than 5 m in my sedan), but you do put much longer RCA cables in a car than in a house (unless you're using a fiber-optics linked audio processor and short RCA lines). Since RCA lines are also the most sensitive to induced noise, they are the problem, not speaker lines.

It could still be interesting to use this nice twisted pair speaker cable, though, if you can afford it, of course : their section is round, so they may be easier to pull everywhere, or to brace several of them in a hose. The question is to be sure it's worth the extra cost ! :laugh: They look great, too.


----------



## Triggz

Read for yourselves the reviews from people that actually experienced silver cables.

LAT International IC-300 Signature Reviews

LAT International SS-1000 MK II Bi-wire Reviews

LAT International AC-2 MK II Reviews

Pick a brand
Manufacturer Product Reviews

A haunted house has that reputation because people are consistently seeing ghost in that house. 
You may not believe in ghosts but you may change your mind when you go in that house and see it for yourself.
I feel that the silver cable myth is the same. 
Silver cables have the rep for being the superior cable. 
You may not believe that it is but you may change your mind after listening to one. 
Reputations always have, at least, some truth to it. 
When a girl has a rep for being a slut...there's some truth to that.
When a guy has a rep for being a player...there's some truth to that.
Asians have a rep for being bad drivers...there's some truth to that.
Aren't you curious to find out if silver cables sound better than your typical cable? 
LAT has a 45 day trial period and I think I'm gonna try em out after I get my Sound Monitor back from Matt R.
The SM has coax digital inputs so I'll try out their small coax cable for my Cowon Q5W.


----------



## thehatedguy

Anything going down the power wire will exist on the ground side of things. You can not separate anything in the car from the ground side of things. Your car's chassis is one large ground wire.

So to say to separate your RCA cables going from the front to the rear from the power wire is a bit absurd when they are resting on the ground "wire" no matter where you place them.

The inducted noise will be just as present in the ground as in the power wire.



Z80_Man said:


> We're not talking about electrons here, we're talking about induction of other signals travelling along the lines.
> 
> The longer different cables travel in parallel, the more they influence each other.
> 
> If the power lines drove idle, flat, absolutely continuous current, if wouldn't really be a problem here (they could still induce a continuous offset, easily removed by the amp's entrances filtering capacitors), but they actually carry a lot of noise.
> 
> Anyway, it's a real problem for low current and high impedance RCA lines, where the noise level is similar to the signal level, but very unlikely to produce effects you'd be able to hear when it comes to the speakers lines. At least, it can be neglected in a car, which is a noisy environment by itself.
> 
> BTW, you generally put shorter speakers wires in a car than in a house (no more than 5 m in my sedan), but you do put much longer RCA cables in a car than in a house (unless you're using a fiber-optics linked audio processor and short RCA lines). Since RCA lines are also the most sensitive to induced noise, they are the problem, not speaker lines.
> 
> It could still be interesting to use this nice twisted pair speaker cable, though, if you can afford it, of course : their section is round, so they may be easier to pull everywhere, or to brace several of them in a hose. The question is to be sure it's worth the extra cost ! :laugh: They look great, too.


----------



## thehatedguy

That is correct. But electrons flow negative to positive, not positive to negative.



Jaredturp said:


> I'm not sure if this agrees or disagrees with what you said, but my knowledge about batteries and grounds and such is as follows.... Electrons follow the entire path from the cathode to the anode. The separated redox reactants in a lead-acid battery want to transfer electrons. They flow through the power wire, the amp, and the ground wire. The PbO and the Pb are separated by an electrolyte that does not allow the transfer of all ions, so the electrons follow the path through the wires attached to your amp. *Is all of that correct?* So the ground and the power would have the exact same problems.


----------



## chad

thehatedguy said:


> Doesn't matter if they are separated from the power wire or not.
> 
> Electrons don't flow from the battery to the amp. They flow from the ground to the battery. Any noise coming down the power wire will be equal in the ground plane of the car. And in a car there is NO way to completely isolate any cables from resting near the ground plane in a car since the whole damn car is a ground plane.


I agree and disagree.

The agreement part, the wire cannot induce noise unless there is current being pulled, if current is being pulled you will have output, if you have output then the S/N is pretty moot at that point. (barring TRULY class A amplification) It takes a bit of current to extend the lines of flux off the power wire in order to induce noise onto a shielded cable. Most issues I have found happen from car wiring such as pops from rear lighting inrush and RF hash coming off of the fuel pump feed.

That being said (the disagreement part) the car chassis and the power wire WILL NOT induce the same amount of noise, the wire will have more. This is because the chassis has SOOOO much more surface area that the lines of flux from induced current cannot penetrate the shield which SHOULD be at the same potential as the shield of the signal cable. Remember, if you ARE getting noise on a properly shielded signal transfer mechanism then it's likely due to currents being set up on the shield itself. This is why it's often customary to leave one end of the shield (normally the destination) open or cap coupled so such currents cannot be induced... Barring RF currents akin to an end-fed radiator.

Clear as mud? I can't think of a better way to describe it without really digging into the guts of the concept.


----------



## Silver Supra

Z80_Man said:


> Brand noted, thanks.


Michael Kelly is the owner of Aerial... he designed the old school A/D/S 300i and 320i speakers.

I've asked him about doing some Aerial brand car audio speakers and he said... maybe. 

Here's a cool article about him.

Home-Grown: Michael Kelly of Aerial Acoustics | Stereophile.com

Typically I am not a fan of Ti tweeters, but his are not harsh at all. Aerials are very non-fatiguing speakers.


----------



## normalicy

Just found this. Take from it what you will.
Speaker Wire


----------



## Audioholic2009

First I must say, I didn't read all posts.

Cables are different (also speaker wires). If you have good system and ears, you may find differences. Differences may be small and everybody can't find those. BUT without listening you can't say which cable is better than other. In one system coat hanger sounds best and in other system thin aluminum coated or tinned copper may be best.

I don't know why people wonder this. This is normal!


----------



## chad

Speaker Wire


Good read.


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## The Baron Groog

chad said:


> Speaker Wire
> 
> 
> Good read.


Indeed


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## 14642

chad said:


> Speaker Wire
> 
> 
> Good read.


Awesome. That just about does it. 
BTW, i think there are still some of those insulators in the garage at my house, which was built in 1895.


----------



## chad

Andy Wehmeyer said:


> Awesome. That just about does it.
> BTW, i think there are still some of those insulators in the garage at my house, which was built in 1895.


I have a bunch of the big ones off of utility poles in my barn, there were there when I moved in.

I should sell them to audiophiles, they are already broken/burnt in.


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## 14642

Turn them into "audiophile chairs" and claim that the property of reciprocity states that there effectively no difference between isolating the wire and the listener.


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## 14642

I want in. We'll be rich. We can sell them for $50,000 each and claim that it's a much better deal than having your house rewired. We can sell a few and then I can quit and open a pizza joint.


----------



## chad

Not hippie California pizza right? It has to have meat on it.


----------



## 14642

No, New York/New Haven style. There's too much tofu pizza here already.


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## MACS

chad said:


> Speaker Wire
> 
> 
> Good read.


That speaker wire section is pure gold .

I have spent so much time reading through Roger Russell's site over the years. Amazing collection of stories and facts. I just wish he would update the McIntosh car audio section.

For those of you that have a day or two of free time to kill, here is the main site. 
http://www.roger-russell.com/


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## TrickyRicky

One word.....audiophoolery.


----------

