psaudio.com Sometimes it's necessary to run long speaker cable lengths up to 50 and 60 feet or more. What's the best way to do that without sacrificing audio quality?
Long run public address speaker systems used to use a “70.5vac” distribution. In fact if you go back far enough McIntosh amps used to have a tube socket connector that carried that output from a special winding on the output transformer. That was for very long speaker wire runs. At the speaker end you’d have a step-down transformer that would match the 8ohm of the speaker. I have no idea if any of that exists today.
Paul I appreciate your time & advice. I will absolutely relate my findings with you as I try to figure best cables (within reasonable budget constraints) to achieve that blissful satisfying sound. I am first trying 12 ga. Monster Cable brand. I already have it from another system. Again, thank you. Laurence in Macomb.
Paul, your advice is highly valued. Sounded like a wireless solution may suit better. One can do AirPlay or BT 5 over it and localised the power source, or go to a DAC solution or even run Cat 5 instead of WiFi. Digital signal don’t degrade up to certain extend as analog copper wire do. PS Love the tappet brothers.
I’ve been known to run 12Ga oxygen free cable, I usually purchase it from the local electrician supply depo. They also have smurf conduit. The cable is Syston 14/2, for shorter runs
PS Audio makes and sells the high quality power cables you are doubting in your comment. This means Paul disagrees with you. Are you aware of that? Serious question. I'm not being rhetorica.
@@charlesferguson6678 Yes, I am aware of that, and I will even recognize that everything makes some difference. But, not all changes are of equal efficacy; some are obvious, some are subtle, and some are actually detrimental. I consider PS Audio to be one of the 'good guys' of the audio industry. Expensive, yes, but not bat-sierra (keep it family friendly) crazy expensive. For locations with poor or even moderately low quality AC power, Paul's Power Plant regenerators make a lot of sense. And if you have the desire and the financial means to seek every last iota of sonic improvement, don't let me stop you. However, I operate at a relatively modest, but still quite enjoyable, level compared to the exalted kit of Paul's and I would rather invest my limited discretionary funds to add new music or fill in gaps in my library of physical media (yeah, Old Dude of the Old School, I even still listen to FM radio). I just have never personally heard an explanation and/or demonstration that definitively refutes my statement. A chain is only as good as it's weakest link, as the saying goes, and that includes what is behind the drywall. As another saying goes, "a difference that makes no difference is no difference." I trust this response is adequately serious. Further affiant sayeth naught.
60 feet of speaker cables in a home with a 12 AWG cable will yield a loop resistance of 0.2 Ohms and insertion loss of 0.4dB and more in the highest treble. The damping factor will be under 20. Theoretically you will lose some control in the bass and some top-end. For a cable this length I would go for a thicker cable. Actually speaker cables matter much more when you have such long length than in a typical system with only 6 feet.
did it. Works great. I don't have other expensive wires for an A B test, but I've never been a spendy wire guy. Two 12/2 Romex wires dive under the mantel: now I've got two floor standers on either side of the fireplace with minimal wire: looks great, and affordable! Thanks!
another inexpensive option would be to use cat5 cable. Either one or two runs would do for each channel. Ideally use the teflon insulated cat5. This is sold at Home Depot as fire resistant cable. Inside the outer shield is 4 twisted pairs of 24 gauge teflon insulated wire. Each pair has a dark colored wire and a light colored wire. You will use all the light wires for the + conductor and the dark wires for the - conductor. To terminate one speaker cable, remove a few inches of the outer shield. Strip the insulation from the last inch of each of the 8 wires. Untwist the wires back a few inches and group all the dark colored wires and all the light colored wires. I twist all 4 of each and the bare copper so that you have one group with dark insulation and one with light. Double check that the + and - conductors are not shorted to each other. I solder all the bare copper into one large wire to make it easier to connect to the speaker or the amp. The advantage of this approach is you will end up with a fairly large gauge conductor with a low impedance. Using one run of cat5 per channel means each conductor has 4 x 24 gauge litz wires which equals an 18 gauge conductor. If you use 2 cat5 cables per channel you have 8 24 gauge wires which is equivalent to a 15 gauge speaker cable with about 8 ohm impedance which will match the speaker well and perform well. The two cables can be twisted over their length to make one speaker cable. The cat5 is sold at Home Depot from a big reel by the foot so you can buy enough to make cables for your specific length.
Finally sensible advice but runs contrary to many other things that Paul has recommended it would appear to me. For example now spend a couple thousand putting in a power plant right?
If you are going to use mains type power cable, I'd definitely be putting it into some tubing etc., so that in the future an errant electrician doesn't accidentally patch it into your mains power setup - BANG! Years ago a company supplied some 'data units' to go into a telephone exchange, and run off the 48V supply commonly used. However the power lead they supplied, whilst having its ends tagged etc. as being for 48V, used normal mains flex. Alarm bells started ringing in my head; nobody listened, then in one came. Its lead had been trimmed to length (losing the tags) then the next tech came along, saw mains flex, fitted an AC power plug and plugged it in - BANG!
I'm using two 25ft runs of awg#8 monster cable i bought off craigslist for 50$ i ran it under floor away from any home power wiring and utilize decent connects on each end. My amplifier is 165w at 8 ohm but i am utilizing 6 ohm mb quart towers currently, amp delivers 225w at that impedience. I have no issues i can relate. Plenty of sound that is clear enough that i no longer listen to some poorly recorded media. With decent cables and good power it will sound just fine.
I have about 60-feet long speaker cables in out apartment, but the system is multi-way, multi-amped with active crossovers, so whatever loss it may have in the high end can be compensated when setting up the crossover gains - plus there is so much power to spare, that whatever the impedance of the cables, it makes no diffeence.
Last time you said that there are speaker wire good for high frequency and speakers wire for the low frequency for bi amp or bi wire, how do I know witch is for the high and for the low frequency is it a matter of thickness or is more than just that?I live in a place that if I ask the store that sells wire he will give me whatever wire is closer to him
I am in the same unfortunate situation running 90 feet cables. I went with 10 gauge bluejeans cable for $1.41/FT. Good prive and works well with my M700 stack and Tekton Di’s
@@gteadventure I am extremely satisfied. I thought I may lose some resolution but I didn’t. I have a bright and resolving system and that did not change any of it. I thought it might have with long runs of copper. No loss in bass either.
@@audiorick841 Thanks for the feedback. I am upgrading the system and need to make those long runs, so it is good to hear of your experience. Thanks for taking the time to reply. R/Glenn
My power amp could do 65A per channel, IIRC. Not familiar with Romex, gauge, etc. I had to look that up. With copper conductors, 12 gauge is listed as facilitating 20 Amps. Maybe 4 parallel runs in that conduit? It will cut the resistance (at the expense, I guess, of increasing capacitance and inductance). I would prefer though the long XLR-balanced pre-amp to power-amp path. Or replace the Magnepans by active monitors with active cross-over and fed digitally.
Ethan really does know his stuff. Great advice Paul. I use Audiophile ear plugs daily from your advice. Lawn mowing, trimming etc. Regular ear plugs made me too disconnected.
Thanks Paul. Very practical and he would still have a budget for a piece of equipment that will benefit his system or buy himself some fine wine at Costco🍷
You could link all the strands in each cable, get 4 lengths of cable (+&- each speaker) and spread them out a bit to reduce inductance. (that may have been what Paul meant?) I wonder if a budget diy shielding would help on this length using copper foil tape - some ebay sourced products suggesting about $20 might do it.
@@poserwanabe Well the Kimber crew swear by the importance of the shielding effect of their woven products (notably in an noisy Pro environment) - personally I don't buy it for home hifi runs, though wonder (key word!) whether there might be a benefit on such a long run? - the logic being; a really long run might be picking up more RFI which might be having an adverse effect on the system. Copper foil tape would be a cheap way of achieving this.
@@robh9079 I know how audiophiles think and I can understand that, I come from an electrical engineering background and I'm also an audio engineer, in 45yrs I've never seen or heard of RF affecting high level cables. Low level yes, but not high level. Do your own research and remember that audio follows the same laws of physics and engineering as any other electrical device, just because the human ear is involved DOES NOT MAKE MAGIC HAPPEN peace... Edit>> unless you live next to an airport, radio or TV station... Edit>>> the "Kimber Crew" has a horse in the race..
@@poserwanabe It was a hypothesis I presented, in the spirit of research and discussion, not an advocation - so thank you for the input based on your significant experience.
I unfortunately had to run 45 feet so I got bluejeans 10 gauge cables and it works pretty good. They are not terribly expensive. Compared to the former 10 feet of 14 gauge on the same system I’m not sure I can hear the difference.
I have a situation were my speakers wires are 20' long which I'm not crazy about. I bought mine from SVS as they had a sale and I like their quality. Another option would be Bluegean cable and they will make any length. I also have Maggie's
I have my speakers running off a combination of stranded and solid core power cables, right now. It sounds better than cheap speaker cable, by a long way.
@Fat Rat add in the stranded power cable for the increased top end. Bi-wiring should work, and find a way to use all three cores, it improves dynamics, I've spent time testing. I spoke to a guy who works for Chord Company, and he basically said a speaker cable upgrade from that would cost £50 a metre and above. So, when I get some spare cash, I'll do that.
Instead of Romex I would order some wire from West Penn wire, I have used it many times for auditorium systems with runs over 200ft, you can get it up to 6awg in 2 or 4 conductor.
For the benefit of those in the UK, am I right in thinking this is the same as 1.5mm (or 2.5mm) twin and earth house wiring cable? One is used for lighting circuits, the larger one for ring and spur power circuits.
Hello, New subscriber here frm Philippines. I bought an LD Systems Dave8 2.1 set up. My question is, im planning to buy center,l,r,surround speakers to have 5.1 set up, can i still use the active sub! Please help me. Thank you.
canare 4s11 would suffice at that length for speaker cable, Pauls correct balanced from the pre amp to power amp/s would be a better idea than long speaker cables.
So using balanced cables is better, so the gauge I should be using with shorter speaker cable, 5-7 feet around 200 watt amplifier just use 12 or 10 gauge??
Yeah, The Tappet Brothers were an important part of my Saturday Mornings for years and years. I hope Peekop and Dropov found good jobs after that gig ended! The day after I had a endoscopy done my wife and I were listening to the show, at the closing credits. We broke out laughing when Ray named the staff proctologist: Cameran DeAss.
Four high-grade 70 or 100 volt transformers, one at each end of each channel, would solve the problem of cable resistance. The problem with this, of course, is Where would you Get transformers That Good?
@@homerwinslow9047 I would hope that there is still some common sense left that one should use stranded wire, but you are right I should have been abit more specific
Unless he has a rodent problem, he really doesn't need to use the tubing, which may, or may not stop the critters chewing habit. He can simply buy jacketed Romex just like you find in your walls now. Sure, you have a third wire, but it doesn't matter and it's a lot easier to deal with, rather than fishing individual wires.
An elegant solution for users of tube amps is 'do nothing'! Since a tube amp's output is basically an AC current-source, the same current will be delivered to the speakers regardless of the resistance added due to the 50-foot cable.
I can vouch for the HF losses with Romex. I think in general, tweekish cables not withstanding stranded cables are a better option. Now I'm wondering if anyone has tried automotive battery cable or amp supply cable?
One sure way to make an electrician scream is to run Romex through conduit. I concur with #10 fine stranded, terminated with crimped and soldered lugs.
@@sailingaquarius23 well we could have a long discussion about what your buddy said but in ALMOST ALL NORMAL SITUATIONS, it's irrelevant...in other words which weighs more a pound of feathers or a pound of steel ???
@@poserwanabe I'm building the enclosures for the isobaric subs and the mains. Im using advantech. Seems really good. I did build a replacement enclosure for the DL's last fall. I'm going be "stacking" sort of. Im still inverted and loving it!
I have done this in the past. What I did was to terminate the Romex in a standard electrical box then wire nut to a short piece of 16ga - 14ga zipcord or a speaker jack. Using a short piece zipcord will not be an issue because the resistance is cumulative for the entire length of the run. A short length of smaller wire has very low resistance. And no, wire nuts will not "sound bad".
There is a happy medium like say monoprice for example there speaker cable in the UL rated for in wall jacket is very inexpensive and uses a good quality OFC conductor and I'd say maby or should be better than Romex? I can't say I have zero experience with that for speakers maaaaby not as good as some foolish mega high dollar cable but if it's sized right I'd say it would be as good (because I'm a big dollar cable non believer) as some $100 a foot conductor... but technically I can't say the expensive cables don't work I've never had experience with it either just heard opinions of respected professionals in audio. If big dollar stuff makes you feel better and you can afford it deffinately do it. I didn't need dual 4 Gauge to my 1200wrms car monoblock amp and 8 gauge speaker wire but I wanted to...
I love when you give practical advice, thanks!
Long run public address speaker systems used to use a “70.5vac” distribution. In fact if you go back far enough McIntosh amps used to have a tube socket connector that carried that output from a special winding on the output transformer. That was for very long speaker wire runs. At the speaker end you’d have a step-down transformer that would match the 8ohm of the speaker. I have no idea if any of that exists today.
Paul I appreciate your time & advice. I will absolutely relate my findings with you as I try to figure best cables (within reasonable budget constraints) to achieve that blissful satisfying sound. I am first trying 12 ga. Monster Cable brand. I already have it from another system. Again, thank you.
Laurence in Macomb.
Paul, your advice is highly valued. Sounded like a wireless solution may suit better. One can do AirPlay or BT 5 over it and localised the power source, or go to a DAC solution or even run Cat 5 instead of WiFi. Digital signal don’t degrade up to certain extend as analog copper wire do. PS Love the tappet brothers.
I’ve been known to run 12Ga oxygen free cable, I usually purchase it from the local electrician supply depo. They also have smurf conduit. The cable is Syston 14/2, for shorter runs
A la Car Talk, your own Stump the Chumps segment would be great!
I have long wondered why people spend big bucks for upgraded power cables when in all likelihood it is Romex on the other side of the power outlet.
PS Audio makes and sells the high quality power cables you are doubting in your comment. This means Paul disagrees with you. Are you aware of that? Serious question. I'm not being rhetorica.
@@charlesferguson6678 Yes, I am aware of that, and I will even recognize that everything makes some difference. But, not all changes are of equal efficacy; some are obvious, some are subtle, and some are actually detrimental. I consider PS Audio to be one of the 'good guys' of the audio industry. Expensive, yes, but not bat-sierra (keep it family friendly) crazy expensive. For locations with poor or even moderately low quality AC power, Paul's Power Plant regenerators make a lot of sense. And if you have the desire and the financial means to seek every last iota of sonic improvement, don't let me stop you. However, I operate at a relatively modest, but still quite enjoyable, level compared to the exalted kit of Paul's and I would rather invest my limited discretionary funds to add new music or fill in gaps in my library of physical media (yeah, Old Dude of the Old School, I even still listen to FM radio). I just have never personally heard an explanation and/or demonstration that definitively refutes my statement. A chain is only as good as it's weakest link, as the saying goes, and that includes what is behind the drywall. As another saying goes, "a difference that makes no difference is no difference." I trust this response is adequately serious. Further affiant sayeth naught.
60 feet of speaker cables in a home with a 12 AWG cable will yield a loop resistance of 0.2 Ohms and insertion loss of 0.4dB and more in the highest treble. The damping factor will be under 20. Theoretically you will lose some control in the bass and some top-end. For a cable this length I would go for a thicker cable. Actually speaker cables matter much more when you have such long length than in a typical system with only 6 feet.
Ah! I hadn't even thought of that! I'm totally going to use it to bury wires under the fireplace. Thanks Paul!
did it. Works great. I don't have other expensive wires for an A B test, but I've never been a spendy wire guy. Two 12/2 Romex wires dive under the mantel: now I've got two floor standers on either side of the fireplace with minimal wire: looks great, and affordable! Thanks!
another inexpensive option would be to use cat5 cable. Either one or two runs would do for each channel. Ideally use the teflon insulated cat5. This is sold at Home Depot as fire resistant cable. Inside the outer shield is 4 twisted pairs of 24 gauge teflon insulated wire. Each pair has a dark colored wire and a light colored wire. You will use all the light wires for the + conductor and the dark wires for the - conductor.
To terminate one speaker cable, remove a few inches of the outer shield. Strip the insulation from the last inch of each of the 8 wires. Untwist the wires back a few inches and group all the dark colored wires and all the light colored wires. I twist all 4 of each and the bare copper so that you have one group with dark insulation and one with light. Double check that the + and - conductors are not shorted to each other. I solder all the bare copper into one large wire to make it easier to connect to the speaker or the amp.
The advantage of this approach is you will end up with a fairly large gauge conductor with a low impedance. Using one run of cat5 per channel means each conductor has 4 x 24 gauge litz wires which equals an 18 gauge conductor. If you use 2 cat5 cables per channel you have 8 24 gauge wires which is equivalent to a 15 gauge speaker cable with about 8 ohm impedance which will match the speaker well and perform well. The two cables can be twisted over their length to make one speaker cable.
The cat5 is sold at Home Depot from a big reel by the foot so you can buy enough to make cables for your specific length.
Finally sensible advice but runs contrary to many other things that Paul has recommended it would appear to me. For example now spend a couple thousand putting in a power plant right?
If you are going to use mains type power cable, I'd definitely be putting it into some tubing etc., so that in the future an errant electrician doesn't accidentally patch it into your mains power setup - BANG!
Years ago a company supplied some 'data units' to go into a telephone exchange, and run off the 48V supply commonly used. However the power lead they supplied, whilst having its ends tagged etc. as being for 48V, used normal mains flex. Alarm bells started ringing in my head; nobody listened, then in one came. Its lead had been trimmed to length (losing the tags) then the next tech came along, saw mains flex, fitted an AC power plug and plugged it in - BANG!
I'm using two 25ft runs of awg#8 monster cable i bought off craigslist for 50$ i ran it under floor away from any home power wiring and utilize decent connects on each end. My amplifier is 165w at 8 ohm but i am utilizing 6 ohm mb quart towers currently, amp delivers 225w at that impedience. I have no issues i can relate. Plenty of sound that is clear enough that i no longer listen to some poorly recorded media. With decent cables and good power it will sound just fine.
Another thing, is avoid running it directly along high voltage. That can cause interference in long pulls
Use 12 or 14 awg low voltage landscape lighting wire...thin, high strand count works very well.
I have about 60-feet long speaker cables in out apartment, but the system is multi-way, multi-amped with active crossovers, so whatever loss it may have in the high end can be compensated when setting up the crossover gains - plus there is so much power to spare, that whatever the impedance of the cables, it makes no diffeence.
Awesome.
Last time you said that there are speaker wire good for high frequency and speakers wire for the low frequency for bi amp or bi wire, how do I know witch is for the high and for the low frequency is it a matter of thickness or is more than just that?I live in a place that if I ask the store that sells wire he will give me whatever wire is closer to him
I am in the same unfortunate situation running 90 feet cables. I went with 10 gauge bluejeans cable for $1.41/FT. Good prive and works well with my M700 stack and Tekton Di’s
I am looking at them for the same kind of run. We’re you pleased with the result?
@@gteadventure I am extremely satisfied. I thought I may lose some resolution but I didn’t. I have a bright and resolving system and that did not change any of it. I thought it might have with long runs of copper. No loss in bass either.
@@audiorick841 Thanks for the feedback. I am upgrading the system and need to make those long runs, so it is good to hear of your experience. Thanks for taking the time to reply. R/Glenn
My power amp could do 65A per channel, IIRC. Not familiar with Romex, gauge, etc. I had to look that up. With copper conductors, 12 gauge is listed as facilitating 20 Amps. Maybe 4 parallel runs in that conduit? It will cut the resistance (at the expense, I guess, of increasing capacitance and inductance). I would prefer though the long XLR-balanced pre-amp to power-amp path. Or replace the Magnepans by active monitors with active cross-over and fed digitally.
Ethan really does know his stuff. Great advice Paul. I use Audiophile ear plugs daily from your advice. Lawn mowing, trimming etc. Regular ear plugs made me too disconnected.
Thanks Paul. Very practical and he would still have a budget for a piece of equipment that will benefit his system or buy himself some fine wine at Costco🍷
What’s the best way to connect to romex cables to the amp and to the speakers?
You could link all the strands in each cable, get 4 lengths of cable (+&- each speaker) and spread them out a bit to reduce inductance. (that may have been what Paul meant?)
I wonder if a budget diy shielding would help on this length using copper foil tape - some ebay sourced products suggesting about $20 might do it.
Assuming you're NOT running parallel with AC lines what's the purpose ??
@@poserwanabe Well the Kimber crew swear by the importance of the shielding effect of their woven products (notably in an noisy Pro environment) - personally I don't buy it for home hifi runs, though wonder (key word!) whether there might be a benefit on such a long run? - the logic being; a really long run might be picking up more RFI which might be having an adverse effect on the system. Copper foil tape would be a cheap way of achieving this.
@@robh9079 I know how audiophiles think and I can understand that, I come from an electrical engineering background and I'm also an audio engineer, in 45yrs I've never seen or heard of RF affecting high level cables. Low level yes, but not high level. Do your own research and remember that audio follows the same laws of physics and engineering as any other electrical device, just because the human ear is involved DOES NOT MAKE MAGIC HAPPEN peace...
Edit>> unless you live next to an airport, radio or TV station...
Edit>>> the "Kimber Crew" has a horse in the race..
@@poserwanabe It was a hypothesis I presented, in the spirit of research and discussion, not an advocation - so thank you for the input based on your significant experience.
@@robh9079 next round on me 🍻
I unfortunately had to run 45 feet so I got bluejeans 10 gauge cables and it works pretty good. They are not terribly expensive. Compared to the former 10 feet of 14 gauge on the same system I’m not sure I can hear the difference.
My thoughts were exactly the same. Best performance per dollar ratio! Far better than romex
I have a situation were my speakers wires are 20' long which I'm not crazy about. I bought mine from SVS as they had a sale and I like their quality. Another option would be Bluegean cable and they will make any length. I also have Maggie's
70' of 10 ga will yield .06 ohms. Negligible to any modern amp. Braided ofc from Parts Express. High end loss is inaudible.
I have my speakers running off a combination of stranded and solid core power cables, right now. It sounds better than cheap speaker cable, by a long way.
@Fat Rat add in the stranded power cable for the increased top end. Bi-wiring should work, and find a way to use all three cores, it improves dynamics, I've spent time testing. I spoke to a guy who works for Chord Company, and he basically said a speaker cable upgrade from that would cost £50 a metre and above. So, when I get some spare cash, I'll do that.
@Fat Rat I don't have a problem disagreeing with a salesman, if I think he's wrong.
Instead of Romex I would order some wire from West Penn wire, I have used it many times for auditorium systems with runs over 200ft, you can get it up to 6awg in 2 or 4 conductor.
For the benefit of those in the UK, am I right in thinking this is the same as 1.5mm (or 2.5mm) twin and earth house wiring cable? One is used for lighting circuits, the larger one for ring and spur power circuits.
I lookd up 'Romex', it looks like the standard 'TPS' building wire as used in Aus
Hello,
New subscriber here frm Philippines.
I bought an LD Systems Dave8 2.1 set up.
My question is, im planning to buy center,l,r,surround speakers to have 5.1 set up, can i still use the active sub!
Please help me. Thank you.
canare 4s11 would suffice at that length for speaker cable, Pauls correct balanced from the pre amp to power amp/s would be a better idea than long speaker cables.
So using balanced cables is better, so the gauge I should be using with shorter speaker cable, 5-7 feet around 200 watt amplifier just use 12 or 10 gauge??
Would stranded copper be better than solid copper? 60’ run
If you are going to run romex for 50 or 60 feet what is the point of following it with a braided cable?
I miss Click and Clack.
Yeah, The Tappet Brothers were an important part of my Saturday Mornings for years and years. I hope Peekop and Dropov found good jobs after that gig ended!
The day after I had a endoscopy done my wife and I were listening to the show, at the closing credits. We broke out laughing when Ray named the staff proctologist: Cameran DeAss.
@@markwagner1997 I'm sure they set up a good retirement package for them through their lawyers, Dewey, Cheatem and Howe.
14 gauge romex wouldn't do the job, Paul?
Im in the middle of a theatre pre wire. Im thinking of running 2 sets of 14 gauge which effectively gives me 10 gauge. Any thoughts
So... if one were to route Romex for a long run, could they use one wire for common with the others for L and R?
Carlos Danger no! You’te going to sacrifise crosstalk between chanels.
I would not advise that because you would be cutting the awg in half..
I’m gonna be running 475 feet of speaker cable to 13 speakers in a warehouse what is the best way?
How about Roamex and 70 volt line transformers on each end?
Are monoprice speaker cables good?
I run long interconnects and my amps are behind each speaker and the speaker wire is part of the speaker.
Four high-grade 70 or 100 volt transformers, one at each end of each channel,
would solve the problem of cable resistance.
The problem with this, of course, is Where would you Get transformers That Good?
Only one load (so not using 70/100V to share to multiple speakers) and the runs not that long, so no, just use a brute force copper solution.
just use 10awg wire, you will be fine
K 6er Make it stranded #10 and it wii be fine.
@@homerwinslow9047 I would hope that there is still some common sense left that one should use stranded wire, but you are right I should have been abit more specific
Balanced yes, put the amps in basement, Canaire cable or Mogami both are good and not expensive.
Unless he has a rodent problem, he really doesn't need to use the tubing, which may, or may not stop the critters chewing habit. He can simply buy jacketed Romex just like you find in your walls now. Sure, you have a third wire, but it doesn't matter and it's a lot easier to deal with, rather than fishing individual wires.
An elegant solution for users of tube amps is 'do nothing'! Since a tube amp's output is basically an AC current-source, the same current will be delivered to the speakers regardless of the resistance added due to the 50-foot cable.
Get some number 10 stranded. And then put it in the Smurf tubing.
Good luck trying to find descent price ofc everything is unlabeled cca now.😢
So is that Papa Smurf or Mama Smurf? Sorry.....I couldn't resist!
Put the Romex into metal tubes and connect the tubes to ground for shielding against noise.
I can vouch for the HF losses with Romex. I think in general, tweekish cables not withstanding stranded cables are a better option.
Now I'm wondering if anyone has tried automotive battery cable or amp supply cable?
Did you measure the loss at the tweeter?
@@andydelle4509 No, it was pretty blatant and I wasn't trying to prove anything to anyone so there were no measurements.
How about zero-gauge arc welding wire? Huge for the bass and tons of fine strands to preserve the highs.
@Fat Rat Now you're talkin' current capacity!
Someone spent a couple bucks with Harry at Audio Dimensions
I would never run Romex just because it's a pain to terminate in audio situations, I run 10awg fine strand copper which is easily terminated..jmho
One sure way to make an electrician scream is to run Romex through conduit. I concur with #10 fine stranded, terminated with crimped and soldered lugs.
An electrical inspector once told me in stranded vs solid wire of the same size gauge that stranded carrys more ampreres.
@@sailingaquarius23 well we could have a long discussion about what your buddy said but in ALMOST ALL NORMAL SITUATIONS, it's irrelevant...in other words which weighs more a pound of feathers or a pound of steel ???
@@poserwanabe I'm building the enclosures for the isobaric subs and the mains. Im using advantech. Seems really good. I did build a replacement enclosure for the DL's last fall. I'm going be "stacking" sort of. Im still inverted and loving it!
I have done this in the past. What I did was to terminate the Romex in a standard electrical box then wire nut to a short piece of 16ga - 14ga zipcord or a speaker jack. Using a short piece zipcord will not be an issue because the resistance is cumulative for the entire length of the run. A short length of smaller wire has very low resistance. And no, wire nuts will not "sound bad".
There is a happy medium like say monoprice for example there speaker cable in the UL rated for in wall jacket is very inexpensive and uses a good quality OFC conductor and I'd say maby or should be better than Romex? I can't say I have zero experience with that for speakers maaaaby not as good as some foolish mega high dollar cable but if it's sized right I'd say it would be as good (because I'm a big dollar cable non believer) as some $100 a foot conductor... but technically I can't say the expensive cables don't work I've never had experience with it either just heard opinions of respected professionals in audio. If big dollar stuff makes you feel better and you can afford it deffinately do it. I didn't need dual 4 Gauge to my 1200wrms car monoblock amp and 8 gauge speaker wire but I wanted to...