Length of Speaker Cables

I am sure this question has been asked many times,but can anyone tell my for sure if it makes any difference to the sound if one cable is longer than the other. I need 2 metres on one side and one metre on the other,it seems like a waste of cash buying a 2 metre pair,

 

nah - no difference at all...

 

Really,none at all?

surely that depends on the wire and your amps.

 

I can't see it with that length of wire...

 

The only time I can see it making a difference is with old Naim amps that use the inductance of the speaker cable to stabilise the amp.

 

It won't make any difference if you go for Nordost cables as the signal travels at around 279,792,458 metres per second which is around 99% of the speed of light. The signal in my cables only travels at 217,201,398 metres per second which obviously means that you can hear the difference with odd lengths.

Edit. Errr I'm joking BTW.

 

If you make them the same length, then you know there can't be any effect due to them being of different length.

Anything else is conjecture.

Having different cable lengths will most likely affect any frequency-dependent stereo perception... as will room furnishings, assymetric positioning of adjacent objects within the room, whether your wife is standing in front of one of the speakers, etc.

At some point the difference between two different lengths of the same speaker cable will be readily audible (say 0.5m vs 15m ) and at this point the difference in lengths will matter

And as ever, whether you can hear it or not is one thing; whether the audible difference matters to you (or which you prefer) is yet another.

Chris

 

Easier to resell if there the same length when you upgrade. I got 1.5m and 2.5m and cannot detect a difference.

 

presumably even less important for AV amps ? because you dial in the delays for each speaker anyway ?

thanks, Mark.

 

I have 3 lengths of cable that i used when re-setting up my Hi-Fi recently. Two lengths are the same (4m) and one is 2.5m. I initially set up using the two 4m lengths but then had 2m of fairly thick cable bodged up behind my hi-fi. I swapped out one of the 4m lenghts for the 2.5m and didn't notice any difference to the sound. I'd completely forgotten that my cables where different lengths until i saw his thread, a pity really as i was listening to records all morning and thinking to myself that things sounded pretty good....

Back in the bad old days i used to measure my cables really accurately when trying new wires and worry if they were even a couple of mm different, thank god i've mostly gotten over that kind of neurosis...

 

The difference in timing is going to be far too small to adjust on a delay setting. Electricity is very nearly the speed of light, and light can travel around the earth over 7 times in a a single second! If you think you can hear the difference it takes light to travel 2m or 1m you are mad , never mind adjusting for it on an AV amp.

The only consideration here should be if you want to sell the cable again or you use an old Naim amp (which needs more than 2m anyway I think).

 

I don't think any sane person is going to be concerned over delays... it's more about impedance seen by the amplifier (a product of the cable's resistance, capacitance and inductance), and whether that characteristic impedance is going to interact differently with the output impedance of the amplifier and the input impedance of the speaker.

There are special cases too (eg Isolda).

 

why not just get a midi system ?

you go to all he trouble of buying the gear that has reduced and equal signal paths ...outputs and inputs balance to less than a tenth of a percent then you stick unequal lengths of speaker cable on ....

that said I agree with all the comments .....but I bet it will start to niggle down the line ...you'll be wondering what if ...so why take the chance ?

 

Yes, but this is sound!! It is a lot slower. The sound starts from the CD and accelerates towards the speed of light along the speaker cables and then slows back down to the speed of sound again as it leaves the speakers. The longer speaker cable gives more time for acceleration and the sound reaches the listener much earlier. :banana: :elephant:

I'll get my coat.

 

Keep them similar lengths if possible. You wouldn't want Ringo falling behind John and Paul.

 

All my speakers are connected with a 4m speaker wire, although when I first connected the extra bits for the AV bit I found the centre speaker was ever so slightly be ahead of the mains (Hi Fi).

I pondered this for a while as it only really appeared during music DVDs (concerts)

The mains come out of the processor then through the pre amp before going into the power amp, while the cntre would come out of the processor and straight into the power amp, a 1m interconnect less !

So I slipped in a 2m interconnect in between the processor and power amp for the centre, and this seemed to solve the problem.

 

thats what i would do..........

I certainly don't have the technical knowledge of many here to prove either way......but as pete says at some point you're going to wonder.............

belt /braces, then you don't have the question mark