The long and short of it...

kp1706

Currently my audio rack sits off to the side of my system. This makes for a long (12ft) and shorter (5ft) speaker cable(s) to my speakers. My amp (Adcom GFA-555) is hooked up to the pre-outs on my HK Receiver (about 18in).

My question is this, would it make much difference if I moved the amp so it was equidistant to the speakers and centered between them thus requiring only a 4ft speaker cable for each but a longer (8ft) interconnect(s) from the receiver to the amp? My TV is in the center but the amp would easily fit in the rack underneath.

kp

thsmith

Any of the options you described will work but I would want the IC the be as short as possible. My spekaer cables are 15' which means one really just needs a 4' cable but I like both cables to be the same lenght just because of my OCD.

steveinaz

Best to keep low-level IC's as short as practical, they're more prone to noise when using longer lengths then a high-level speaker cable.

SCompRacer

I have my gear on a side wall and broke the rules with ~17 feet of single ended IC's (RCA termination) between my pre and amps. Pics are in my showcase, link in sig. I can provide names of folks from CP that have heard there is absolutely no noise/hum from my speakers with the volume cranked full clockwise with no music playing. The system sounds just as good compared to using shorter IC's. My IC's are coax with a stranded center conductor. The stranded core makes them flexible. Shielding would be very important with a long run.

kp1706

SCompRacer wrote: »

I have my gear on a side wall and broke the rules with ~17 feet of single ended IC's (RCA termination) between my pre and amps. Pics are in my showcase, link in sig. I can provide names of folks from CP that have heard there is absolutely no noise/hum from my speakers with the volume cranked full clockwise with no music playing. The system sounds just as good compared to using shorter IC's. My IC's are coax with a stranded center conductor. The stranded core makes them flexible. Shielding would be very important with a long run.

Thanks for the feedback. I like your setup-lots of power. What brand interconnects are you using?

SCompRacer

Thanks! I'm all GIK Acoustics with four stacked Tri-Taps in the corners and three 244 panels to partly cancel the rear wave from the panels. Acoustic treatments made me wish I would have treated rooms long before messing with gear.


Here is a thread by a fellow CP member that describes in his words what it sounds like.

http://www.polkaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?t=86154&highlight=acoustic

I use Sanders Sound Systems IC's.

reeltrouble1

there is no requirement either way is any better, well, another way to say it is each way has strengths and weaknesses, as it is all dependant on your given situation, if you use a connect over 10 ft go balanced, although going balanced with all connects trumps unbalanced at any length....this tv set you speak of can cause you trouble for 2-ch stereo.

so as you can see by Richie's rack that rig uses a long connect to the amps, albiet he is playing with hi-fi where everything matters exponetially, still in any rig everything matters.

have fun and do not be afraid to experiment with moving things around a bit and listening to what you hear.

RT1

SCompRacer

You get what you accept Ted, and I wouldn't accept anything less than hi performance or the gear would be between the speakers effing up the sound stage. Folks can choose to believe what they want, but the long IC's do not cause a problem in my system.

reeltrouble1

no doubt, lets see, we have never actually visited listening rooms, that is a damm shame, if I recall my present connects to the amp are 5m so we are basically doing the same thing, on a seperate thought, well I am hanging up my six-gun for good next year in August so I have a cousin in Chicago been meaning to go see and I want to plant a wet one on H9, hear Blake's rig, pick a rose from Carl's garden and I would like to get my ears on the Sanders and that Vinyl Rig. to hear what the fuss is all about.

I concur, moving the rack to a sidewall improved the soundstage and is all that and a bag of cherry jelly beans for asthetics, recently I got a bump from some foundation techniques. Still working a bit on consistent energy dissapation. I know all those tubes are being bombarded, just working to find the good vibrations and eliminate the bad equally across the board and that is the tricky part, but a little at a time its getting there. I have pictured the component cabinets doing nasties to the internal elements, Gawd, we know though the equal reaction equation to any given change, how to apply or rather what to do with energy once isolated. Given a sheet of mylar, stators, electric charges with waves pulsing everything from every which way it is suprising anything pleasing results. but then I am rambling.

RT1--Long/Short--Ying/Yang--Tension/Release

dkg999

I'll have the camera ready for that H9 wet one thingy

heiney9

Ted, you are welcome anytime. You were actually pretty close last year when you visited relatives in Wisconsin. Blake and I live about a couple blocks apart so that's an easy one.

Doug, not sure we want a photo of that floating around on the internets :eek::D.

Plans are shaping up very positively for Lou's shindig and all signs look good that I'll be attending, with Doug as my partner in crime or vise versa. It would be nice if Rich could get away as well.

hearingimpared

Well for years I use to keep the electronics to the side or even outside the room that the speakers reside. I always had a high or higher noise floor. Perhaps I wasn't using the proper ICs nevertheless, I've now placed my rack between my speakers for the first time in my life (about 5 years ago) and it DOES NOT interfere with the soundstage or imaging, not one bit. I did however notice that I needed more isolation and vibration damping control with it between the speakers.

Richie can vouch for that. Although his golden ear detected some bass being trapped in the corners where the speakers reside . . . Thanks a lot Richie, I have been able to get that out of my head since :mad::p and have been trying all kinds of home made bass traps in the corners with no luck. I'm going to have to somehow save up some dough to get "Realtraps!"

I remember when Ted moved his rig from between his speakers to the side wall when he had his rig in the Woodshed and he told me he was very pleased with the improvement in sound.

There certainly is a lot to consider when placing your gear in your room.

steveinaz

SCompRacer wrote: »

Folks can choose to believe what they want, but the long IC's do not cause a problem in my system.

Key words being "my system."

madmax

I use some pretty long IC's (MIT S2 10') and they sound no different than the short ones. One benifit of having the equal distance in the middle is that the bass is generally nulled out there and that can keep vibration of the equipment to a minimum.
madmax