Long speaker cables?

Hi All,

If I have flexibility in power amp and
pre amp positioning, is it better to have
long 3m runs of interconnect cabling
between pre-power and short 1m speaker
cables or vice versa?

Thanks,
Matthew

 

I punted up that type of questions, with 5m being the length in question, and was advised that although theory says its better to have short speaker cables there is not much to it in practice under 10m.

 

Tricky one.
You'd imagine losing more signal on the interconnects as its a smaller signal but then why do active speakers sound so good?
Can't you borrow some cables and do some experimentation?

 

Hi,
Do you have the facility to use balanced interconnects?
This would definitely sway the decision in favour of short speaker runs.

 

yes, I've been told that about balanced interconnects, which seems to be what is used in the industry for long lengths - but we are talking long, much greater than 3m.

 

Do as you like, it will make little difference.

 

Balanced cables are used due to their inherent noise rejection which, as you said, is especially beneficial for longer runs. Most people tend to use shielded interconnects in their Hifi (not me) for the same reason even though they may be as short as 20cm.
I suppose that the benefits to you are dependant on length of cable and also any local sources of noise/RFI.

The issue here is that any noise picked up on these interconnects will be amplified with the full gain of your power amps with no volume control in the way to reduce the levels in proportion to the music signal. Imagine that your preamp reduces the music signal to the level you want but the noise is picked up afterwards on the way to the power amps and then amplified. Theoretically at least your system could sound worse at lower volumes. Practically? I'm not so sure.

I would always advocate the use of balanced connections where the facilities exist but I wouldn't necessarily modify my gear to balanced configuration or purchase a piece of gear because of it.

Hifi is all about those extra little things that add up to the one big thing that sounds so good.

I think this is something that you need to try for yourself. There will probably be very little difference unless your amplifier is very sensitive to capacitive loads found in some cables.

The truth is .... you'll never know until you try.

 

slightly off-topic: I was very pleased with an upgrade from single-ended to balanced on by dac/pre as this made the best of a bridged poweramp, and v-v. There has been noticeable improvement. So, go I'd say pay money to be balanced. But I think we are on the same page, its all in the synergy.

btw, I use the Goertz speaker cables but that's another set of arguments

 

I thought I might twist this thread by weaving one on different speaker cable lengths
https://www.audio-forums.com/as-rediect/showthread.php?t=15653
and asking whether it matters if interconnects are not exactly alike.

 

I much prefere short speaker cables and longer ic ......I've wired mine both ways ...there is some science that backs this up ..but can't remember why.

 

As far as I know (not a lot) it is because the ideal load for an amplifier is purely resistive and speakers cables also have capacitance and inductance. I believe that the damping factor can also be affected but this is where I get a little out of my depth because I cannot understand why line level connections don't suffer the same problems (except damping factor of course).

I guess I'd better do some research.

 

If the balancing is implemented well then it's often "cleaner / better" - if not then it can sound pretty poor - bolting on an average quality phase inverter to the main 'single ended' output from a source to give the "-ve" and having the combining / regenerating circuitry in your amp adds complexity and components (and of course balancing does bu££@£ all to deal with RFI so you still need braiding / twisting / shielding or whatever!)
From my experience if you've piles of cable all over the place, patchbay style ;-) then balanced is a good idea. In a home system I've found good single ended is as good as good balanced - and vica-verca!
IC and speaker cable lengths - when I had a pair of mono blocs they sounded better with 5m pbj interconnects and short speaker cable than with short interconnects and long cables - anyone want the 5m RA cable?.
But I guess you've got to try it in your own system to see as Ditton says - it's that synergy thang!