Bi Wire

[Oregon]

Prior to this latest adventure in audio excellence, my audio "mentor" had me using this cable. The impossible small lettering reads "M2750/76MR2/UOO 05973. That could also easily be H2750/76HR2/U00 05973. Where would you seek this wire spec?

Thanks,

Cody

Edited October 20, 2023 by Oregon

[Oregon]

The edit window is only 5 minutes...

This is the silver plated cable exposed.

Is this stuff any good?

Thanks,

Cody

 

Edited October 20, 2023 by Oregon

[Oregon]

.055dia over the bare metal.

[GdnrBob]

17 hours ago, Oregon said:

Talked to AudioQuest, the cost of a 3' run of Bass/Zero loudspeaker cables is about equal to the cost of my 2's.

There are many good wires by Audioquest that are less expensive. Given that you own the 2's, I would recommend finding a nice used set of GO-4's. Or, better yet, call Johnny Rutan at Audioconnection. He knows AQ cables and Vandersteen inside out and can give you the best info. PM me if you want his number. I believe he has some cables to loan out for trial, too.

bob

[Oregon]

Rutan setup the 2's for the Guttenberg video. In his review, Steve made mention of John having sets of Audoquest biwire spades.

John Rutan is rarely at his shop. Getting past the person answering the phone has not been possible yet, and, I don't wish to be a bother.

Thanks.

:^)

[BKDad]

22 hours ago, Richard Vandersteen said:

Bob, yes, the HPA Interface Cable is the only wire that can be safely used with the M7-HPA and the M5-HPA and is now included in the price.  Any other Interface would need to be sent to the factory and tested for safe use.  Neither amp has ANY compensation circuitry to protect it from oscillation which would blow up the amplifier and speaker.  All amplifier circuits want to oscillate into certain loads, so designers use stop resistors, compensation capacitors, emitter resistors and even output inductors to slow down the circuit enough to prevent this.  Unfortunately, these protection schemes hurt the sound and affect transparency.  We have no need for all this extra circuitry because the load is carefully defined, hence amazing sonic synergy with our speakers.  RV

Just to add to this, for the technically inclined.

What RV said above is 100% accurate from a technical perspective.  Here's two articles that explain why.  Warning - some math is involved.

Prevent Emitter Follower Oscillation

Why Circuits Oscillate Spuriously

But, if you can carefully control impedances - which includes the effects of the cabling - you can get around this.  This means not just in the audio band but up through several MHz.

I've often wondered how much the cables and the load affect the sound quality of an amplifier.  Amplifiers almost always get measured with close to perfect loads.  That might not be that illuminating or relevant.  When I see overshoot in an amplifier's square wave response in a review, I stop right there.  This is just one reason why cables matter in design as well as in length.

[GdnrBob]

3 hours ago, Oregon said:

John Rutan is rarely at his shop.

I have his cell. He answers quickly, unless he is with a customer.

B

[Oregon]

I would not wish to be a bother to the guy. As I dislike talking on the phone, I naturally assume all others do as well.

Thank you,

Cody

[GdnrBob]

Talking on the phone is how he makes his business. 

I never cared for dealers, but Johnny listens and gives good advice, for free.  Once I found that out, I knew he was one of a kind.

B

[Oregon]

2 hours ago, GdnrBob said:

Talking on the phone is how he makes his business. 

I never cared for dealers, but Johnny listens and gives good advice, for free.  Once I found that out, I knew he was one of a kind.

B

🙂

[ctsooner]

Give Johnny a call.  He loves to share what he knows.  Great guy.  Most all of the Vandy dealers I’ve met over the years are

[Oregon]

Well, for the past two weeks my back has been AFU from moving my new electronics (Manley Snappers/Jumbo Shrimp) and rearranging furniture in the war room/man cave.Been seeing my chiropractor twice a week, it's getting better, still grabby. Looking forward to hearing the "new" rig.

This "time out" has allowed me to sort out all the biwire advice. Thank you.

Currently,  my home-made biwire conglomeration consists of two separate runs of loudspeaker cables utilizing the wire shown earlier within this thread. Also, I will be creating a new conglomeration from wire other than that shown earlier. Finding information on audiophile grade wire (not from loudspeaker cable manufacturers) has been fruitless. 

Should any here have recommendations as to bulk loudspeaker cables, again, not from loudspeaker manufacturers) I would be forever indebted. Spending as much for new loudspeaker cables as the retail on 2Ce Sig II's ain't gonna happen.

Off to call Rutan...

Edited November 2, 2023 by Oregon
Old age

[ctsooner]

Let us know what he says.  

[BKDad]

Here's the thing...

My observation is that every season (about every two to three years) a new generation of state of the art cables comes out.  They are revolutionary and everybody seems to be overwhelmed with how well they perform and how much better they are than last season's cables.  Kind of like the world of fashion.  You just can't be anybody without these cables.  (I know that I personally feel great shame that I am using cables about as old as our Quatro CT's which are maybe seven or eight years old.  Time flies when you're having fun, which we are with the Quatros.) 

But, the cables lower on the hierarchy of greatness tend to evolve rather than evolve.

So, that gives you a couple of opportunities.  

One is to purchase last season's greatest after they have been gently broken in by the previous owners who want the newest and greatest.  Prices drop a lot on expensive cables.  But, they still cost a lot.  Much like Ferraris.

The other is to purchase last season's not-the-greatest cables.  These are probably a very large percentage as good as the newest greatest cables, for a lot less money.  They are probably very close to the goodness of the current not-the-greatest cables because these cables evolve over time.

OK, enough philosophy.

Before we bought the Quatros, we used 2Ci's for more than a quarter of a century.   After much experimenting, we ended up using Tara Labs Space and Time with TFA Return cables for almost the entire time we enjoyed the 2Ci's.  I can heartily recommend those cables.  They were not expensive.  (More shame for me)

So, I looked around just now to see if anybody was selling those cables on the used market.  No luck.

But, I did find something that you might wanna check out.  AQ GLC Speaker Cable  This cable seems similar in design to the Tara Labs I just mentioned, but without the TFA Return, which you could add yourself if you wanted to.   I'm not sure this cable is even manufactured any longer.  The cable is probably a few seasons old.  But, for the price of the raw cable it seems like it might be an interesting experiment to give it a try.   Note that you can buy a 328' spool of the stuff for about $130, plus shipping.  You can buy less, of course.  Please note that I haven't tried this GLC stuff, but at the price I won't feel guilty if you spend $30 for 30 feet and don't like them at all.

Usual disclaimer:  I have nothing to do with either Audioquest or HCM Audio.  They wouldn't know me if I showed up at their front door with a name tag.  Of course, since I'd have to wear a bag over my head when going to an audio vendor's place because of the shame mentioned above, they probably would turn me away before they even got to the name tag thing.

[TomicTime]

i guess i am wayyyyy out of fashion…at least with this system….. Audioquest Type 6 in a shotgun biwire circa 2002 with juice from a modified MC 240 circa 1961…. my age…..

[TomicTime]

on a more serious note, i would look at a star quad Canare, failing that look for surplus sales of aerospace grade silver inside Teflon…

[Oregon]

3 hours ago, TomicTime said:

...look for surplus sales of aerospace grade silver inside Teflon…

Duckduckgo here I come.

Thank you,

Cody

[Oregon]

3 hours ago, BKDad said:

AQ GLC Speaker Cable

Thank you,

Cody

[BKDad]

13 minutes ago, Oregon said:

Thank you,

Cody

I wonder how it compares to AQ 6 from a few seasons ago...

[Holmz]

5 hours ago, TomicTime said:

on a more serious note, i would look at a star quad Canare, failing that look for surplus sales of aerospace grade silver inside Teflon…

Teflon has a relatively high dielectric constant.
Whether that matters or not … ??

[ctsooner]

You don’t need to go crazy with cables and cords,  unless you have the ability to and you want that last 10th of a degree.  For the cost of some cables and cords, you can do a full component upgrade that will probably be a must larger bang for the buck.  Most don’t have the money up front to do the component upgrade, so they go the peripheral route instead (a wise speaker designer once said that to me and it stuck).  We all have been there (Progressive Insurance commercial. 

I’ve always just sent folks to the best AQ cables they can afford comfortably and everyone usually is very happy they did.  It will be interesting to see how this situation goes and what OP thinks they like best.