Carol vs. RCA Speaker Cables

teligent

I need about 150 ft. of speaker wires form my 7.1 HT set up.

Has anyone purchased Carol brand 12 AWG cables from Home Depot? Are they any good? I can get them for $0.34/foot. Plus, they are made in USA.

Or should I stick with 14 AWG wires from known brands like RCA, AR or Monster? They go for $80 for a 100 ft. spool. These wires are marked "100% oxygen free copper - digital speaker cables". Are these wires any better? What makes them 2x more expensive? They are all made in China. Is the extra money for the brand name?

Any insight would be helpful. Thanks.

steveinaz

Home Depot wire can have a tendency to turn green; don't know if the specific wire you're talking about has this problem...

Also consider Radio Shack for "bulk" wire purchases. They have very good quality stuff, usually less expensive than AR or Monster. Discussions about the quality/audio properties always sparks major controversy. If you stick with a RS 12 or 14awg stranded OFC, you should be fine; if you're ultra-fussy about your sound quality you may want to investigate "specialty" cables.

Whatever you decide, I would recommend 12awg in a multi-strand wire.

Early B.

Don't know about their speaker wire, but I've used Carol brand for making DIY power cables with good success.

teligent

Thanks all for your quick reponse.

What about 100% oxygen free wires? Are they better? The 12 AWG stuff at HD is NOT oxygen free - is that a big deal?

I just found 12 AWG oxygen free cables (made by Sound King) at Parts Express. They run for about $40 for 100' ft. Seems like a great deal to me. Haven't heard this company's name before though. Any thoughts?

Thanks again for your insight.

steveinaz

To quote:

"those wires will be conducting long after we enter the oxygen free zone..."

LMAO!!

Frank Z

The Carol Superflex 12 ga cable should not be confused with the HD in-house brand (mfg'd by Wood I believe). The Carol wire from HD is the same as the Carol wire available from Partsexpress.com.
I paid $0.44/ft and haven't had any problems (I.E. discoloration). Get it and don't look back.

PolkThug

I just checked my 12AWG HD wire. None of it is green, still looks new. If it does turn green, I will spend another $11.80 to replace all the speaker wire for my front speakers.

Regards,
PolkThug

dorokusai

Go HD, when your ready for the future, drop us a line again

Seriously let us know what you think about your project, all data is good data.

bknauss

Originally posted by steveinaz
Home Depot wire can have a tendency to turn green;

I also had Monster cable speaker wire do the same thing... take that information and do with it what you want to...

wlrandall

Originally posted by bknauss
I also had Monster cable speaker wire do the same thing... take that information and do with it what you want to...

Same here, but only the Original Monster. The XP that I have never has.

alexcua

Try going to Hifi Buys. I know they are normally more expensive but I was able to buy 310 ft of 2 wire #14 CS3 for the price of 200 ft @ 0.55 / ft so that works for me. The salesman in my area told me he usually gives an additional 20' for each 100' of wire. Since I was getting 200' he decided to give me what's left of the entire spool since only less than 60' would be left.

bknauss

Originally posted by wlrandall
Same here, but only the Original Monster. The XP that I have never has.

I forget what line it was... it was whatever was available when I was working at Best Buy years ago.

yale006

HD has worked ofr me. Save money.

dbournival

I wired second system with 12 Ga Carol (Grey In-wall) from HD. As many here said "wire is wire". But I felt it never sounded very good. I replaced the fronts with some 20 year old Monster cable as a test, they did sound much better. My rears (50 foot runs inwall) I left alone until I got fed up with the muddy sound this weekend.

I replaced the rears yesterday with Monster XP-CI and the difference is huge. Just my $0.02...