legacy product speaker wire question

khingila · 2267

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Offline khingila

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on: June 18, 2015, 02:17:10 PM
i recently moved, and the configuration of my new living room makes it desirable that i have speaker wires about 16 feet in length between the paraglow 2 and parabee 2 and straight 8 on one of the channels of my bi-amped system. is that too great a distance to be feasible, and, if not, what is the wire gauge necessary to connect effectively?  thanks for any assistance anyone can offer.

Joe Piecuch

khingila


Offline Paul Joppa

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Reply #1 on: June 18, 2015, 05:52:35 PM
The technically simple answer is no, it's not a problem.

This is based on the observation that SETs (unlike high-feedback amps) have enough output impedance to totally swamp the resistance of any reasonable wire. There may of course be more subtle effects that have as yet no known technical basis.  :^)

I am old enough to have seen the broad consensus that 10 or 12-gauge solid core was the best speaker wire, followed by the emergence of multi-strand as superior, and then the extended fashion for small-gauge solid core, and of course silver vs copper vs graphite(!) vs tungsten ...  so I take the more subtle effects with a grain of salt, even when I hear them myself.

Paul Joppa


Offline khingila

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Reply #2 on: June 18, 2015, 06:18:00 PM
thanks so much; i appreciate it.

khingila


Offline mkane

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Reply #3 on: June 19, 2015, 12:26:29 PM
  Heck, mines 30'.



Offline Bill Epstein

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Reply #4 on: June 20, 2015, 11:55:26 AM
I've been "swamping" 20 feet of triple braided 16 gauge with my SET for years 'cause I figured, A: My passive control to amp ICs should be short and B: Mastering studios use miles of speaker cable.


VPI Traveler/ZYX R50
Cinemag 3440 AH
Steve Brown Caravaggio Phono
Foreplay 2.1
The Twins: 55 Watt Mullard 5-20 KT-88 mono-Blocks
4 Pi Speakers


Offline Doc B.

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Reply #5 on: June 20, 2015, 06:56:41 PM
Studios don't typically use long runs of speaker cable. They typically use long runs of line level cabling.

Dan "Doc B." Schmalle
President For Life
Bottlehead Corp.