Using Thin Low Quality Speaker Wire?

JonBoy

Active Member
Joined
Mar 20, 2005
Location
Hampstead NC
Just wondering what would happen if I ran some speakers prob 25 to 30 feet with some cheap thin speaker wire? prob 50-75 watts RMS. there smaller polk speakers 5 1/4 with a tweeter and a Yamaha Reciever. Have not had rear speakers in about 2 years and wondering if I ran some thin wire that I can hide how would it work?
 
As long as you're not worried about sound quality, and it sounds like you're not, it should work out fine. Really tiny wire probably won't carry a true 50-75 watts.
The longer the run, the bigger the wire needs to be. But in this case, you don't need gigantic wires for no more than you're running through it.

And don't fall for the "quality wire" crap. The brand of wire, or how much you pay for it, makes absolutely no difference.
As long as you're running the correct size wire for your application, you can run the cheap stuff from Lowe's and it will sound exactly the same as if you bought a 5000 dollar wire from a high-end stereo shop.
Think of it this way: Open up your receiver, amp, DVD player, TV, etc.....and look at what kind of wire it has inside it.
You won't find any Monster Cable. Just plain old copper wire, no matter how high-end your stuff is.
 
Pacfanweb said:
As long as you're not worried about sound quality, and it sounds like you're not, it should work out fine. Really tiny wire probably won't carry a true 50-75 watts.
The longer the run, the bigger the wire needs to be. But in this case, you don't need gigantic wires for no more than you're running through it.

And don't fall for the "quality wire" crap. The brand of wire, or how much you pay for it, makes absolutely no difference.
As long as you're running the correct size wire for your application, you can run the cheap stuff from Lowe's and it will sound exactly the same as if you bought a 5000 dollar wire from a high-end stereo shop.
Think of it this way: Open up your receiver, amp, DVD player, TV, etc.....and look at what kind of wire it has inside it.
You won't find any Monster Cable. Just plain old copper wire, no matter how high-end your stuff is.
Click to expand...

Sorry as someone who has installed roughly 500 high end surround sounds in the last 5+ years I have to disagree, somewhat.

Different qualities of wire DO exist. The most expensive are not always the best, but the tension strength on the winding reels is just one area that comes to mind where low cost manufacturing hurts performance. Often in low quality wire applications you do not get the speced product delivered. Whether it is broken strands withing the jacket or poor twist amongst the strands.

Twist count and tightness can have a HUGE difference on sound quality, IN HIGH END APPLICATIONS.

If you have less than 2grand in your surrund sound (including speakers, receibver and installation) you are right, run it through a coat hanger it wont matter. If you have a high end system, wire quality absolutely matters.

Connectors are a whole other issue. Poor quality connectors will ruin an other wise top notch system and poor quality crimps and connections ARE THE NUMBER 1 PROBLEM I FIND ON MOST POOR QUALITY SERVICE CALLS.

All that said, Monster brand is right beside Bose in my book. Better sound through marketing. Both are far inferior to other more economical alternatives. BTW with a little looking and common sense you can quickly learn who makes Moster's wire for them and buy the exact same product with out the Monster name for LITEALLY 1/8th thee cost ;)
 
Roger Russell designed the highest of high-end equipment for McIntosh.
http://www.roger-russell.com/wire/wire.htm
Great reading about speaker wire.

I've never seen an actual, scientific listening test of speaker wire where anyone could tell the difference between the proper gauge el-cheapo wire and the high-end stuff.
And I'd say Roger Russell knows more about this than everyone on this board together.
Even if you could hear a difference, you certainly couldn't hear it with the OP's setup.
 
SkyHiK5 said:
All that said, Monster brand is right beside Bose in my book. Better sound through marketing.
Click to expand...

:lol:

"No highs, no lows, it's just Bose"

Like Starbucks coffee.. Mediocre coffee, well marketed.
 
I don't care about highs or lows. My grandfather owns 50% of the Bose stock and I love that family discount :flipoff2:
 
Josh C said:
I don't care about highs or lows. My grandfather owns 50% of the Bose stock and I love that family discount :flipoff2:
Click to expand...
Well geez...if my grandfather had been Sam Walton, I still wouldn't buy my home theatre equipment from Wal Mart, just because I got a discount.
And that's about where Bose belongs. It doesn't totally suck, it's just WAY overpriced for what it is.

I bet even with a "family" discount on Bose, you could still buy a better system for less.
 
Pacfanweb said:
Roger Russell designed the highest of high-end equipment for McIntosh.
http://www.roger-russell.com/wire/wire.htm
Great reading about speaker wire.
I've never seen an actual, scientific listening test of speaker wire where anyone could tell the difference between the proper gauge el-cheapo wire and the high-end stuff.
And I'd say Roger Russell knows more about this than everyone on this board together.
Even if you could hear a difference, you certainly couldn't hear it with the OP's setup.
Click to expand...

Well, I understand your point, but you miss 2 key parts of my "argument".

#1 CHEAP wire will not spec to the guage sold as often timees. So if you are doing installs with cheap 14ga you might as well be using 16 or sometimes even 18 ga.

Again I am not talking monster here, or even your connector cables. I am talking about your infrastructure, and long runs. In many newer high end homes I have done by the time I chase up and down a wall and run half way down the house length wise to a data closet, it is not uncommon to have wire runs of over 100', no where in his article does he discuss long wire runs.

#2 All the research there is discussing 80s technology. Todays high end equipment is pushing much more power, often through much lower impedance speakers.

Also, while I know who Roger Russel is. ANYONE who says (as he does in the linked article) that speaker runs through solid gauge 12AWG wire will produce acceptable quality, I discredit on that statement alone. A solid wire does not absorb harmonics AT ALL and will cause signal integration. And I can tell the difference between a solid and stranded wire without fail aurally. As can ANY audio techie.

As to Josh C, I hate to call you misinformed, but...

Amar Bose still owns well more than 50% of the company he founded. His wife who is president of the company owns more than 10%.

Bose ranks consistently in the Forbes 400 and is worth well in excess of 1 BILLION dollars..... unless your Gpa is an Indian national who resides in Massachuttes and teaches at MIT, I dont think he owns 50% of Bose....
 
You have good points, but today's equipment is not pushing more power than McIntosh stuff did, even 30 years ago. I have an old McIntosh amp I use in my HT setup, for the main speakers, which is 200 wpc into 8 ohms, and 400 into 4 ohms...continuous, capable of even higher peaks. And it wasn't even top of the line way back when. Mac had 1000 watt monoblocks 15 years ago. (I'd love to have 7 of those in my HT, and so would my power company)
Nobody is running any more power than that now, and even if they do, they simply need a larger wire to push it through.


Speaker technology isn't significantly better, either. McIntosh and other high-end speakers from 15 years ago still stand up to today's best very well.
The point is, Russell's article is not based on some old-timey, 40 wpc tube crap. It has older info, and it has newer info, too.


I totally agree that very cheaply-made wire might not be as good as some slightly-less-cheaply-made wire. Russell even mentions that in his article, complete with a picture of some wire from China vs. another kind that is supposedly the same guage...the Chinese junk is much smaller. Look under the "All Low Cost Wires Are Not the Same" part of his article.
Speaker wire is all about one thing: Resistance. If the wire is big enough to carry the load you're sending through it, then putting a bigger wire or a more expensive wire is not going to make things any better.


And yes, he does discuss long wire runs in his article. He actually has a chart with recommended sizes of wire for runs up to 200 feet.


If you can show me a few TRULY scientific, double or more-blind tests of some actual, audible differences between
different wires that have the correct resistance for whatever system they're installed in, I'd love to read them.
Just listening to a system, then replacing or rewiring it and listening to it again is simply not a valid test, no matter what anyone THINKS they hear.
Roger Russell is a legend, and he is still designing high-end, 15k+ speakers today. Heck, even now, McIntosh's top of the line speakers are basically just re-works of his older designs, and their latest incarnation was recently called by one editor the "best sound he's ever heard".
So to say his results are based on 80's technology is inaccurate...he is still up to date, and his article even references some wires that are like 5000 bucks for 6 feet or so.
I'm pretty sure they didn't have wire that expensive in the 80's.
 
SkyHiK5 said:
As to Josh C, I hate to call you misinformed, but...
Amar Bose still owns well more than 50% of the company he founded. His wife who is president of the company owns more than 10%.
.
Click to expand...

Ask Mr Bose where he got the funding to start the company in college. It was his roommate who happened to be my grandfather. The stock was split 50/50 and couldn't be sold out of the family unless back to the company or another family member
 
Josh C said:
Ask Mr Bose where he got the funding to start the company in college. It was his roommate who happened to be my grandfather. The stock was split 50/50 and couldn't be sold out of the family unless back to the company or another family member
Click to expand...

Josh, please stop digging.

Amar did not start the Bose corporation until he had been out of college for neearly 10 years. When he did start the company he was a professor at MIT, I somehow doubt he needed funding from a college roomate.

Again I will say, he is listed in the Forbes 400. If there was another 50% owner said person who have the same net worth. No one else in the Forbes400 listed as a Bose investor...

Now lets try basic Math. Amar owns at least 51% since he is MAJORITY owner, his wife owns 10%, your grandad owns 50%. DO we see a problem yet?

I do not doubt you grandad was indeed a friend, maybe even an investor, may even be worth $1billion himself, but 50% just seems unfeasible.

Of course maybe Amar invested his profits and your Gdad blew it all on whiskey women and 4wheeling :beer:
 
If we cross on the trials I'll make a phone call and let you get the details 1st hand on how the 2 were college roommates, the investments the stock and all.
 
Is Josh's granddad Y.W. Lee? If so, he doesn't have the Bose stock anymore. and Josh has been pwnt by SkiHiK5.

Bose started his company at the suggestion of MIT professor Y.W. Lee, who provided Bose with $10,000 in start-up capital. That investment would later be worth an estimated $250,000, when the company repurchased Lee's stock in 1972.
Click to expand...

http://www.answers.com/topic/bose-corporation
 
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