Many, many moons ago a german HifI mag, ie late '80s, did some blind tests regarding bi-wiring.
As far as I remember the result was that firstly differences were marginal but single wire and wire jumpers were indistinguishable from full bi-wiring indicating that the usual jumper plates were degrading the SQ a little bit and using proper cable jumpers or bi-wiring merely brought it back to the SQ of non-biwirable crossovers.
As far as I remember the result was that firstly differences were marginal but single wire and wire jumpers were indistinguishable from full bi-wiring indicating that the usual jumper plates were degrading the SQ a little bit and using proper cable jumpers or bi-wiring merely brought it back to the SQ of non-biwirable crossovers.
You guys are either crazy, or have some type of systems I've never seen. I found very early on that I have to bi-wire. Running just a single wire to the speaker didn't make much sound. Someone told me it has something to do with "circuits" and current flow or something. I could be remembering wrong.
You guys are either crazy, or have some type of systems I've never seen. I found very early on that I have to bi-wire. Running just a single wire to the speaker didn't make much sound. Someone told me it has something to do with "circuits" and current flow or something. I could be remembering wrong.
Well you do have a point here. Without a positive and negative connection, the circuit doesn't work very well.
I suppose we should really refer to it as quad wiring.
Excellent Poe by the way.
henrylrjr said:
Is there absolutely any difference detectable using high resolution, sophisticated instruments. Yes, BUT this is at the level of scientific/engineering caveats.
Like the fact that nothing in science is ever "proven", you simply have the preponderance of evidence and nobody has been able to come up with an explanation of how anything can be different. This sort of qualification is the source of a lot of the woo, that is use to justify things like bi-wiring.
The reason why the differences don't matter however, is that you need test equipment that is WAAAYYYY more sensitive and accurate than the human ear to detect this level of differences.
Engineering has a lot of "Okay if you are taking into account every possible factor in the most extreme circumstances you do need to account for X, but at the level at which we will be working, this is completely and utterly irrelevant, so we are just going to ignore it." But people who want to justify their pet hobby horse or convince themselves that they have the secret mystic key that unlocks the absolute best in SQ (or just want to sell some expensive gear) seize on these sorts of caveats to justify it.
If you want the best sound quality there are basically two things that matter.
Your room and your speakers.
If you want to unlock the best possible sound quality, that is where you spend your money.
Worrying about things like bi-wiring or any of these little tricks, so beloved of many, is a waste of time and money.
The room is almost certainly the most overlooked and the most often neglected. There are good reasons why you can get some very elaborate and sophisticated rooms for audio testing and recording. In a lot of cases it is either impractical or impossible or in-wifeable, to fix all the issues with a room. But really it can be as important as your speakers in your sound.
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Thanks for the article, that at least provides some basis for rational discussion.
Now I may be missing or misunderstanding something, as college was 25yrs ago and I haven't kept current, but from reading what was at your link, what they showed was that there is no difference with a resistive load, but that there was an effect on the signal when hooked up to a passive crossover (ie. speaker).
However, as far as I can tell they don't seem to have quantified how much of that effect was simply due to the passive crossover being connected and how much was due to the wire. The difference between the resistive load and the crossovers would seem to indicate that the effects from the crossover dwarf anything from the cables.
Now they say it varied noticeably between the cables, but at least to me they all look far more similar than different. Now the pictures for the graphs aren't very high resolution, but they also don't get into what those differences are or what if any effect they would have.
They also didn't seem to have tested the characteristics of the cables to see what if any differences there were on that end of things. I do know for example that there have been "high end" cables that managed to actually make things worse due to poor design.
Bi-amping is not completely useless like bi-wiring, but the basic fact is that it is typically at most a very marginal improvement. It really only makes sense if you are working with an active crossover, in which case it is a completely different beast.
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Bi-wire was a method that allowed stores to sell twice the overpriced useless wire and may stayed in business just a little longer. I am not saying there is no possible benefit, but unless you have already bought the very best speakers made, spent just as much on the room treatments, have a stack of superb equipment, and master recordings, you should spend your time and money elsewhere.
I believe the crossovers should be close to the drivers
and each driver's xo should be connected together close to each other
I'm sure there is some kind of 'interaction'
but please don't ask me why or what
biwire only makes sense if biamped(passive)
and that to me only makes sense if you strive for monster sound
or want to use very small amps that can't handle bass
but I may still try it again one day
just to see/hear if this was true or not
tin - bi-amping makes a lot of sense for a lot of reasons - particularly if you're using a smaller Full-range driver for mids-top (and there are lots of 3-4" that work very well in that application)
included among the options so allowed is the ability to mix amp types and power levels - for example a nice SET on higher sensitivity Full-range and SS brute on the woofers
included among the options so allowed is the ability to mix amp types and power levels - for example a nice SET on higher sensitivity Full-range and SS brute on the woofers
These are the only scenarios where I can see there being a significant advantage to passive bi-amping.
If you have a driver that has an efficiency that is close to the S/N ratio of the amp, so that you would be getting noise amplified to audibility. Using something with a better S/N ratio for that driver would definitely yield some significant benefit.
Or if there was a major mismatch in the power handling of the drivers.
Either is pretty rare, even with with DIY builds. Though it would be somewhat more frequent with DIY, since the DIY designs don't have to satisfy a mass market.
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or like mating a compression driver with a low gain amp or power buffer
maybe I can still build that 5watt amp and make use of it
First, sorry to George for being a bit snippy in my response. I was having trouble wrapping my head around:
Second, thanks to Chris for adding one of the advantages of bi-amping with a passive XO.
The one I was thinking, especially since the OP has a commercial speaker, is that it allows that particular model to be used in more environments. More adaptable speaker, more sales? It also allows the person to move without having to change their speakers. I think that is more than marginal. I wasn't thinking one man, one room, one speaker, I was doing the big picture thing.
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