Bare wire, bananas, or spade termination

quadzilla

Hi,

Being very new to HT, I'm trying to understand the best way to terminate cables. I've decided on bluejeans cable with bananas at the receiver end, but what about at the speaker end? I know the speakers I have all support both banana and bare wire, but, for example, can I use spades on a CSi5or is it recommended to go with bare wire at the speaker end?

TIA

dorokusai

Bananas.

treitz3

'Nanners

jacob.simpson

Bananas just to be safe from loose strands getting shorted, other i would prefer just bare wire, i ordered mine from monoprice.

tonyb

I just dig the guy's name......reminds me of my old 8 track player.

quadzilla

Thanks guys. Bananas all around it is, then. I was actually kind of hoping that'd be the answer, since that makes my life a lot easier.

steveinaz

I love banana's. Had spades for many years, but banana's are far more convenient.

teatouch

Bananas make life easy after you make the wires

flipcap22

I used to use bare wires but recently I've been playing around a lot with moving my speakers around so bananas made it more convenient.

jacob.simpson

Received Monoprice open screw type bananas, the quality is outstanding, i went to BB to compare them took actually one with me to compare,
BB is selling them for much higher than MP for the same product.
I infact ordered 30 pairs incase if i run multiple room speakers.:D

zingo

jacob.simpson wrote: »

Received Monoprice open screw type bananas, the quality is outstanding, i went to BB to compare them took actually one with me to compare,
BB is selling them for much higher than MP for the same product.
I infact ordered 30 pairs incase if i run multiple room speakers.:D

That's what I like to hear!

zingo

jacob.simpson wrote: »

Bananas just to be safe from loose strands getting shorted, other i would prefer just bare wire, i ordered mine from monoprice.

You can also tin them with silver solder if you want a low cost solution that will keep the strands together and prevent oxidation.

MLZ

I like spades at the speakers (less stress on the binding posts, sturdy connection that won't pull out - though locking bananas also work) and locking bananas at the amplifier (our cleaning service moved the amp and one plug came undone) as spades are difficult to get on the amps binding posts.

BlueFox

Depends on what you want from a "perfect" sound perspective. Every connection has the potential to add distortion. Bare wire eliminates one (unnecessaryh) connection. If you do use bare wire be sure to wrap it clockwise around the post. This way it will increase its connnection as the binding is tightened. Wrapping it counter-clockwise makes it very easy to accidentally loosen the connecton while tightening the binding. The end result being less than perfect sound from the system.

Hillbilly61

I agree with Bluefox that each connection is a potential failure point and I use bare wire twisted as he describes to lessen that reality. I don't move my speakers around often, so the convenience of bananna plugs didn't really matter much. A loose wire shorting a terminal is a much bigger risk though with naked wire connections and nanners are pretty foolproof from shorting if the speaker or amp accidentally gets pulled away from its connection. They also look nicer!

Like any mechanical connection, get good quality ones if you go that route. The pro electronic techicians I used to work with not only got top shelf stuff, they "religously" soldered a plug's internal connections if possible. Doing prevented crimp or other friction type connections inside the plug from working loose over time.

arkaig1

Re bananas vs. open wire, my 15 month old child, after 4 months being oblivious, and us carefully hiding 95% of the wire, has discovered the only 3 inches of the wire we could not hide. That is where it connects to my left tower. There is slack, but I'm curious: would open wire survive a minor tug/pull better than banana clips, or vice versa? Opinions? Horror stories? Success stories?

SolidSqual

Go bananas it doesn't matter.

WilliamM2

arkaig1 wrote: »

Re bananas vs. open wire, my 15 month old child, after 4 months being oblivious, and us carefully hiding 95% of the wire, has discovered the only 3 inches of the wire we could not hide. That is where it connects to my left tower. There is slack, but I'm curious: would open wire survive a minor tug/pull better than banana clips, or vice versa? Opinions? Horror stories? Success stories?

If your child tugs on bananas, they will come out, or maybe break if pulled sideways. That's a good thing, much better than the tower being pulled over on top of him.

arkaig1

I knew I'd be going bananas eventually. Right now we're working on an "all no-cords" (lamps are the more common worry, also clocks) no-no campaign, but the entertainment unit is in the double-room in which we leave him longest beyond our reach.

Thanks folks! Bananas it is!

DV1

Holly Banana!!!