Bi-wiring Recommended!

SolidSqual

Hey Guys,

I biwired my system using Canare wire from BJC. Holy hell, it does make a difference. Ok maybe not a big holy hell, like going from Bose to Polk, but nonetheless Holy Hell.

My Rti8s are performing noticeably cleaner highs. Before the bass slightly muddied the treble, but now the bass seems to support the treble more than ever before.

Not a crazy improvement, but definately brought a wry smile to my face.

zombie boy 2000

Did you bi-wire or replace the jumpers?

SolidSqual

I bi-wired and removed the crappy brass jumpers.

zombie boy 2000

SolidSqual wrote:

I bi-wired and removed the crappy brass jumpers.

Gotcha.... so you have bi-wire cables. Specifics, if you'd be so kind?:)

ahorvitz

Nice work. It's a great, cheap upgrade, isn't it?

SolidSqual

I spliced the four ends of the canare cable. Then I attached four bannana plugs to one end(2+, and 2-). Next I attached a bannana plug to the 2 negative ends on the other, and did the same for the 2 postive ends. All in, I used 6 bannanas for one cable. I connected the end with four plugs to the speaker and the end with 2 plugs to the amp.

SolidSqual

Yeah, to be honest, I'm surprised the upgrade made an audible difference. I've read the science behind the idea, but the elctricity all comes from the same source, so I was naturally skeptical. At any rate, it works!

amulford

You should try Bi Amping...

sidespin

I'm getting a pair of Monitor 60's by next week sometime. I was thinking of bi-wiring them, maybe Audioquest bi-wire cables or something decent but not too expensive. I don't have a separate amp, as they will be powered by my Denon AVR 1804, which pumps out 90 WPC. I use my system for mostly HT.

Will bi-wiring make a difference? Or should I just go the other route and remove the brass jumpers, and i guess use 12-14 ga. speaker wire to connect the posts and wire one of the terminals? I don't think bi-amping is a possibility as I won't be buying a separate amp. I'm not sure if an amp is needed for the Monitor 60's. From what i've read, the Monitor 70 & Rti-8 is about where extra juice is needed in the current Polk line. Correct me if i'm wrong.

JKnPA

Sidespin.....
If you want to bi-wire, you have to remove the jumpers!
See link below........ par. 1.13 and figure #5.
* One advantage to bi-wiring is that you seperate the bass( driver & Xover filters) from the mid/tweeter units.

http://sound.westhost.com/bi-amp.htm#bi_wiring

JK

SolidSqual

Maybe when I get some more money I'll try bi amping, but for now I"m good.

Sidespin: You should just make your own cables. It is incredibly more cost-efficient and offers a good reason to sit down and listen to some tunes while working. Blue Jeans Cables sells all that you would need to get started.

sidespin

Thanks for that link JK. There was some good info I just learned from there.

SS, I have made cables before, ie. - putting banana plugs on the ends of speaker wire and the like. But, i've come to realize my handiwork is not that of Michelangelo. This is more true of my car, where my handiwork has already led to some problems. Granted, making speaker wire is easier than taking apart car door panels and installing new speakers, so we'll see. The speaker wires I made look kind of shabby and just don't feel legit. I figured buying a ready-made product would alleviate those concerns. Althought buying a 50 ft. spool of speaker wire would of course be more cost-efficient. I will take a look at the bluejeans cables though. Maybe if i had the proper tools as well. I don't have a wire stripper, as I just use scissors, which sometimes doesn't work well. I always have to check if I cut off some strands of wire. Is a wire stripper a worthwhile investment? I'm guessing it costs anywhere from $10-20.

Gabor

SolidSqual, I'm glad that you brought up this thing, I am skeptical too. All that you've done, theoretically, decreased the wire resistance and separated the signal going to your low and high frequency speakers. If I got it right.
Will you post a link so I can get some background on bi-wiring?... But I'll try it definitely, you sound quite happy with your result.
...Never mind. I just noticed JK's link above, it tells it all.

zombie boy 2000

sidespin wrote:

Maybe if i had the proper tools as well. I don't have a wire stripper, as I just use scissors, which sometimes doesn't work well. I always have to check if I cut off some strands of wire. Is a wire stripper a worthwhile investment? I'm guessing it costs anywhere from $10-20.

A wire stripper is an extremely worthwile investment -- and one that can be made for about 9 or 10 dollars... Just make sure you get one that goes down to 10 gauge, and more importantly, differentiates between stranded and solid core (obviously you want the former)...

that is to say that 10 gauge stranded is a different size than 10 gauge solid

McLoki

I would be very interested in you just running a single speaker wire to your speakers and replacing the jumper between the terminals with a 6" strand of your speaker wire of choice.

If you get a chance try it and report back if the benefits you hear are from running 2 strands of wire to your speakers or from replacing that brass jumper with decent speaker wire.

I do not know what the answer is, but would be interested to hear your opinion of it. (one way or the other)

Michael

MillerLiteScott

I was talking to a guy at Tweeter today and I asked him about Bi-wiring.

His suggestion was to wire both A and B speaker selections to the seperate inputs on the speakers for high and low with the bridge removed of course.

So what I am saying is you would wire the left A speaker selection to the high input on the back of the speaker and the left B speaker selection to the low input on the back of the speaker and do the same for the right side also.

I asked about Ohms and impedence and he said iit was no different.

Is this right or do you just wire from the A speaker selection.

I'll hang up and listen.

Scott
Enjoying my first Miller Lite for the evening.

McLoki

MillerLiteScott wrote:

His suggestion was to wire both A and B speaker selections to the seperate inputs on the speakers for high and low with the bridge removed of course.

So what I am saying is you would wire the left A speaker selection to the high input on the back of the speaker and the left B speaker selection to the low input on the back of the speaker and do the same for the right side also.

What you are describing is called bi-amping. Actually using a different amplifier channel for the top and bottom binding post.

Bi-Wiring is using separate wires to the same amplifier channel.

Some say they all sound the same others say they all sound different. Smart people listen to opinions, then test it and decide for themselves....

Michael

MillerLiteScott

I bought more speaker wire so we shall see tomorrow if it makes a difference.

Has any one ever tried using both the A and B channels to power 1 pair of speakers?

F1nut

Scott, if you are hanging out in that Tweeter store in Towson, the only guy that knows his sheeeet is a fella named John......if he's still there. Run down to Soundscape on Coldspring Lane for a real hifi experience.

Has any one ever tried using both the A and B channels to power 1 pair of speakers?

Do you have an AVR or stereo receiver?

MillerLiteScott

F1

I do stop into the Towson Tweeter about once a week. I will try to stop into Sound Scape next week and have a look see.

Are you local?

I think tomorrows race will be quite interesting. Weather during Quali jumbles the field and makes for some exciting racing on Sunday.

Can you bi-wire a single pair of speakers using both the A and B speaker selection? I have a 1999 Yamaha RX V795 5.1 ( it does have pre out for an external amp for the future. Or I just might replace it with a newer AVR )

Scott

F1nut

Definitely get down to Soundscape (is it one or two words, I don't remember), while not offering the highest end gear around, they have a better selection of power and source gear than Tweeter.

More or less.

Another F1 fan, excellent!

You can, but I don't think you'll hear a difference. It's kinda the ghetto way. I've had better results using high quality jumpers. So, you might want to try using jumpers made from the same or better speaker cable that you're using now. Remove the stock jumper plates first.

Some of the better AVR's with separate amps for each channel allow you to use any unused amps to bi-amp.

MillerLiteScott

I will go down to Sound Scape this coming week. I like fact that it is family owned.

I ran seperate wire from my A speaker out put to both sets ot terminals on the back of my speakers and my initial observation is smoother blending of low mids and highs.

I think my next move will be an SVS sub. And I will go from there because I really can't listen to anything with much volume because of the rest of my family.

Scott

Alonso WDC 2006

F1nut

I take it you removed the stock jumpers, right?

Buy them earplugs for Christmas.:D


Let's hope so!

MillerLiteScott

Jumpers out.

Ear plugs would make good stocking stuffers. And cheap to boot.

Kimi WDC 2007.

Scubadoo

I tried bi-wiring. To be honest, I can't tell the difference. There are some opinions that bi-wiring is bad. See http://www.sonicdesign.se/biwire.html.

MillerLiteScott

Great now I am really confused.

Schwingding

McLoki wrote:

What you are describing is called bi-amping. Actually using a different amplifier channel for the top and bottom binding post.

Bi-Wiring is using separate wires to the same amplifier channel.

Some say they all sound the same others say they all sound different. Smart people listen to opinions, then test it and decide for themselves....

Michael

The A and B speaker selectors use the same amp, so this would not be a valid definition of bi-amping.

Like the other poster, Scott, I notice no difference with biwiring on my RTi10s.

Here is a link to what I found to be very interesting discussions on bi-wiring/amping.... http://sound.westhost.com/bi-amp.htm#basics

Schwingding

MillerLiteScott wrote:

Can you bi-wire a single pair of speakers using both the A and B speaker selection? I have a 1999 Yamaha RX V795 5.1 ( it does have pre out for an external amp for the future. Or I just might replace it with a newer AVR )Scott

Yes, you can. Or, if your banana plugs allow for it, you can jumper a pair onto the A speaker pair.

My AVR does allow reassignment of the rear surround amp to support the mains in bi-amp fashion, but it is only a duplicate of the main signal. To receive the most benefit from bi-amping, you would want to only send the highs to the one amp and the lows to the other. Still, when I tried it on my old Monitor 70's, it did make an appreciable difference. Separate amps (and better speakers) made an even larger difference than any AVR combo I could dream up.

surfntomm

Scubadoo wrote:

I tried bi-wiring. To be honest, I can't tell the difference. There are some opinions that bi-wiring is bad. See http://www.sonicdesign.se/biwire.html.

i have done bi wiring as well with several different amps with 12 guage wire on my rti70's and i have heard no difference so i just put the jumper back in. in the 10th post on this thread i believe where the link to the article is, it states in there that bi-wiring may not yield significant results if you are already using thicker wiring but i did notice a great difference when i changed my wiring from 18 gauge to 12 gauge.

is the brass jumper really crucial to change, can you guys actually hear the difference?

Scubadoo

For short runs (my speakers are less than five feet away from the amp), I've read that 18 gauge speaker wire is adequate, which is what I'm running in bi-wire mode right now. As I said before, I can't tell the difference between bi-wire sound and single-wire sound with 18 gauge. I'd be amazed if 12 gauge would make any difference in single or bi-wire mode over a five foot run of speaker wire.

Check out http://www.roger-russell.com/wire/wire.htm#anhonest for all you ever wanted to know about speaker wire.

F1nut

Scubadoo, if you buy into that article, you have a lot to learn about audio.