Hi guys! As i almost finished my sistem,im now experimenting with diferent type diy interconect cables. I try diferent copper versions,tick wire,thin wire,mesh shielded,aluminium foil shielded,full wire,many thin wires,quad star construction,spiral construction,etc. Now i make 2 version from silver plated copper 1mm thick full wire. Thats for now the most detaild and open,clear sounding one. Im waiting now for second order of silver plated copper wire,this time 0.2mm,0.3mm,0.4mm and 1mm.
I read that thiner=better for interconnect.
I also read that foil based cables sound the best.
So its very interestig research for me. Im planing to make and test many more,just to play and to get the best from my sistem. So i was thinking its maybe good idea to make thread so we can share expirience and good recepy. For long time i was thinking that cable dont have big importance in sistem,and that can not efect so much on the sound,but now with TH100 SA monoblocks and Dallas II speakers,the diference is more the ovious.
So anyone who have some good expirience with some diy cable,fell free to share recepie for all other willing of good and detailed sound.
In research like this,its not posible not to find many good words about "The supercable cookbook" but i cant find it anywhere. From tube state its impossible to order.
Have any one copy willing to share?
My next project is thin silverlated copper interconnects. I will post resultats and photos.
And here is few photos from cables made and tested.
I read that thiner=better for interconnect.
I also read that foil based cables sound the best.
So its very interestig research for me. Im planing to make and test many more,just to play and to get the best from my sistem. So i was thinking its maybe good idea to make thread so we can share expirience and good recepy. For long time i was thinking that cable dont have big importance in sistem,and that can not efect so much on the sound,but now with TH100 SA monoblocks and Dallas II speakers,the diference is more the ovious.
So anyone who have some good expirience with some diy cable,fell free to share recepie for all other willing of good and detailed sound.
In research like this,its not posible not to find many good words about "The supercable cookbook" but i cant find it anywhere. From tube state its impossible to order.
Have any one copy willing to share?
My next project is thin silverlated copper interconnects. I will post resultats and photos.
And here is few photos from cables made and tested.
This are the silver plated copper 1mm full wire. Best sounding for now. Blue one is spiral wounded,with 5cm "step". That was the best without shielding. Then i put aluminium folie oraund and it make it mudy. And with such big transformers and high current i can not have unshielded ones. Blac wersion is the same wire,with 3. one acting as shielding. This is the best one for now.
In the above cables, everything is wrong.
For RCA unbalanced analog interconnects, the only thing that matters is:
A coax cable with a heavy braided shield.
For RCA unbalanced analog interconnects, the only thing that matters is:
A coax cable with a heavy braided shield.
I tried some 3rd party cable made from copper with some silver strands mixed in for a pair of Audeze LCD-X headphones (about 30 ohms). The cable sounded awful, not as good as the stock cable. Then I got some bog standard 22ga star-quad and made a HP cable out of that. That sounded far better than either of the first two cables. The trick with the star-quad is to strip off the rubber jacket yet leave everything else intact. Don't remove any of the cotton-like string wrapped with with wires. If you want you can slip a braided plastic sleeve over the cable. The braided sleeve is far better than rubber for SQ. Rubber is probably better for wear and tear over the long run, but that was not the first priority in this case. Also, the shorter the cable the better, so don't make it longer than needed. You might be very surprised.
For line level cables, I don't think you're doing it right. There is a way to make better cables but they aren't thick, aren't flat, and they're not braided. All I can say about that.
For line level cables, I don't think you're doing it right. There is a way to make better cables but they aren't thick, aren't flat, and they're not braided. All I can say about that.
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Good effort woodnes.thats the diy spirit.i use neotect upooc ag solid 26awg for interconnects.sounds awsome and totally diy.keep on experimenting.
Take Neotech SOCT-28 and Teflon tubing 1.2-1.5 mm outer diameter. Rub the Neotech with your fingers and slowly remove the insulation. Doing all this with cotton gloves, it is not good for sweaty fingers to touch the bare wire!!! Insert Neotech into the Teflon tube and fill the ends with Bison epoxy glue and with that you have trapped the air in the tube... Of course the wire must be longer on both sides by approx. 1 cm. Now twist the two tubes slightly and fix the ends again with Bison epoxy glue. Add makeup, solder RCA and play. If you have money, SOST wire is better!!! Use any other epoxy glue instead of Bison.
Wow,sounds good. I know that pure silver is probably end of the road on wich i walk. Didnt know neotech have such good wires.
Sure when i will ordering,i will order silver,not copper. And it already have teflon insulation. And the price is ok. For 26 is little expensive becuose i need amlost 2 meter of interconnect. One monoblock is far away from other components and i must have. Maybe 1.5m will work. But then the other one i want also 1.5 m just to keep things simetrical.
And what about shielding? Do you have on this neotech wire cables some shielding or how is constructed?
Picture always says many words.🙂
Today i play with my son and try to put silvercoated copper 1mm diameter wire on speakers. I was also blown away. Clear detaild sound,maybe little week in bass,but bass is so define. So i ask my self,is it bass weeker or its just appers to be strong due to mudines?
One way or another,its so cleaner that i totaly swich cables. Finaly mudy rock music plays clean. And classics with many instruments,wow.
And i have feeling that there is more to be cleand.
I want to try copper foil for speaker cable. So if someone have expiridnce whit that,please shere.
Some pic from speaker cable test and change.
Sure when i will ordering,i will order silver,not copper. And it already have teflon insulation. And the price is ok. For 26 is little expensive becuose i need amlost 2 meter of interconnect. One monoblock is far away from other components and i must have. Maybe 1.5m will work. But then the other one i want also 1.5 m just to keep things simetrical.
And what about shielding? Do you have on this neotech wire cables some shielding or how is constructed?
Picture always says many words.🙂
Today i play with my son and try to put silvercoated copper 1mm diameter wire on speakers. I was also blown away. Clear detaild sound,maybe little week in bass,but bass is so define. So i ask my self,is it bass weeker or its just appers to be strong due to mudines?
One way or another,its so cleaner that i totaly swich cables. Finaly mudy rock music plays clean. And classics with many instruments,wow.
And i have feeling that there is more to be cleand.
I want to try copper foil for speaker cable. So if someone have expiridnce whit that,please shere.
Some pic from speaker cable test and change.
For speaker cable don't waste time with foil, nor with silver. Seriously, try properly wired star-quad. It works. Bass is good, highs are not muddy, etc.
Basically, there are 4-wires in a cable with two different wire colors. You tie the same color wires together at both ends. So it effectively becomes like 2-wires total.
Here you go: https://www.canare.com/speakercable
Some reviews:
https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/canare-4s11-how-good-are-they
https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/final-report-canare-4s11-speaker-cable
EDIT: Also, like I said above in an earlier post, for better results you can strip the rubber jacket off. Just leave everything inside the rubber perfectly intact. Slide it into a plastic braid material if you want a new jacket for it. This stuff is fine if you pick the right diameter you need: https://www.techflex.com/general-purpose/flexo-pet
Because I gave you this information for free and because it doesn't use expensive nor exotic materials you might not think its the best, better than foil, better than braid, better than silver, etc. Try it and see. The reviews are not wrong.
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When it comes to speaker cables, one could argue that the best cable:
is similar in length and style to the one that the loudspeaker designer used to voice the speaker.
any cable much different than that may change the voicing of the loudspeaker.
is similar in length and style to the one that the loudspeaker designer used to voice the speaker.
any cable much different than that may change the voicing of the loudspeaker.
Are you try this or its just addvice from internet? Have you listen to foil cable?
My expirience is not good. I didnt try canare cable,but i try diferent typs of cables. I have 10m good quality dhirlded star quad cable,i try it for interconnects. But i never have idea to try it for speaker cable.
Why? Becuose my expiridnce is that full wire sounds much beter then wire made of many thin wires.
I try many combinations befora i end up with 18 squere mm per wire,each made od 3x6 squere mm.
When i mske this csble,dound openx,volume go up. And now thin silver one plays even better. So i have good expirience only with full wires.
Thats way i asking did you try/listen or its just a feeling.
Copper foil its not so expensive. You can buy 10m x 50mm x0.3mm under 100€. And if you can make cable sounding like cable of few k€,then its not to expensive.
I didt hear foil cables in live,but watching and reading online, anyone who put foil cable,there is no going back. Not even to bu sure its better. Thats why im so curious to hear how that can sound.
Thanks for your input and recepe. Probably i try later make one cable from quad star cable what i have just to see diference in comparesen to silverplated one.
Made copper foil spk cables a long time ago, perhaps 20+ years, when those were really en vogue. Liked them a lot briskly, eventually got tired of all that lightning fast speed with strange tonality.
Wire is too system/taste dependent to make any strong or universal proclamations about superiority. Contagious internet craze does not help either.
Wire is too system/taste dependent to make any strong or universal proclamations about superiority. Contagious internet craze does not help either.
I wrote about trying it for 30-ohm planar headphones in post #4 of this thread. Also, I use a different kind of star-quad for my speakers, but it was custom made for a friend and is not sold.
No, but I know a guy who among other things designs very good cables. He designed my speaker and line level cables. However, I can't talk about the IP because its not mine. He has listened to all kinds of cables over the years including foil. According to him star-quad is better for speakers.
For line level cables with star quad, I would try the trick of stripping off the rubber jacket and see what you think. I don't exactly how or why that works the way it does for speaker cables, but it IME it does help. The important thing if you try that is not to disturb anything that was inside the jacket. There are little strings between the wires that have to be there to maintain the star quad geometry. So leave all that stuff intact. Only remove the rubber jacket, and tell us if you hear any difference.
Also, it tends to help to keep the cables no longer than they need to be.
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Trust me simple copper wire is absolutely fine for speaker cables. Nothing fancy is required, just enough copper to keep the total resistance low enough (which means longer runs may need thicker wire). Budget a total round-trip resistance (perhaps 1% of the speaker impedance, so 80 milliohms for 8 ohm speakers). So 1mm^2 will do upto 2.5m, 2.5mm^2 upto 6m, 4mm^2 upto 10m run.
I have 18 squere mm copper until now 2x6 full and 1x6 made from mani thin wires,so 3x6 per pole ,but 0.75mm squere mm silver coated copper works better,cleaner,more detaild.
I try today quad star copper,4x 1.5 squer mm,but its not even close to puriti of silver plated copper. I will try to make quadstar with this wire to see if i get any more improvnent.
I try today quad star copper,4x 1.5 squer mm,but its not even close to puriti of silver plated copper. I will try to make quadstar with this wire to see if i get any more improvnent.
Not canare,some germany company,i need to look again,forgot the name. And i didnt strip the rubber jacket.
You mean outside ruber jacket,shielding and iner ruber jacket or just outside one?
You mean outside ruber jacket,shielding and iner ruber jacket or just outside one?
For line level cables I have not tried stripping the rubber jacket off of Canare star quad cable. For one thing, I use a different type of line level cable which was custom manufactured and is not sold.
So you would be doing the jacket experiment perhaps for the first time on line level cable.
So you would be doing the jacket experiment perhaps for the first time on line level cable.
The gentleman was interested tweaking sound of his system with exotic and or expensive cables. For Canare star quad speaker cables and for people who are going to try different cables to tweak their sound, why not suggest something low cost that sometimes helps (at least it may help on some systems and for some people who hear differences in speaker cables). IOW, just trying to help save the guy some time, effort, and money, and hopefully end up with something he will like. That said, don't know if the same trick works for line level cables, since I haven't tried it for that.
OTOH, for people who don't hear differences in speaker cables or other cables why would it be of any interest?
OTOH, for people who don't hear differences in speaker cables or other cables why would it be of any interest?
Why not? My current IC between DAC and amp is a balanced unshielded PBJ-style hop. Dead quiet. Likewise when it was unbalanced. Radio stations in the two top markets in this country for decades ran audio balanced over hundreds of feet of unshielded 24-pair CAT3 and telco open frame punch blocks with no noise or crosstalk issues. The technical requirements for moving audio a couple feet are often wildly exaggerated.