First off, I'm not a "techie" by any means and will make some generalizations, but just hear me out on this.
I realize that the question that I am about to ask may (very likely?) stir things up over whether cables (in this case, speaker cables) make a sonic difference in one's system or not to begin with, but that's not what I am trying to get at here - so, please lets not make this into a debate over speaker cables themselves. With that being said - I am basing this thread on the assumption that speaker cables DO make a difference in sound.
(http://pic5.audiogon.com/i/c/f/1278718055.jpg)
I just happened to be looking at an ad posting for a Naim 250 power amp that is similar to the one I own (the one pictured above is modded, mine is stock) and had a revelation of sorts after looking at the internal wiring of this amp. Almost every cable manufacturer advertises their products based on their technological breakthroughs via their unique design and/or proprietary specification of raw materials, etc... We've all seen it... they all try to sell the differences in metallurgy, winding geometry, dielectrics, gauge, composition (stranded vs. solid core) connectors, solder etc... (Again, I'm not looking to debate the merits of how each manufacturer chooses to create their product here.)
OK. Now, here's my question... finally! How can any speaker cable make a difference in a system's sound when the wiring inside an amp from speaker cable inputs to the rest of the amps circuitry is so small and to the untrained eye like mine, so non-descript?
I guess the same question can be asked in relation to the interconnects and/or power cords in your system. Whether it's signal or current (I'm assuming that there's a difference between the two; then again I told you I'm not a "techie"!) aren't our components limited to whatever is the smallest (read: tightest or most restricted) path within the overall circuit?
Oh, and one last thing to be put on the record. I have heard and do believe that the cabling in one's system can make a difference (for better or for worse) in sound.
Comments?
SN
I would think that the simplest high level answer is that the magnitude of any "distortions" are cause by a wire would tend to be a function not only of the properties of the wire bat also of it's length. So in a case like this it is possible that the wire is so short that it really doesn't do any "damage" to the signal. (This alsohas a base level assumption that wire can sound different, if you don't buy into that then all bets are off.)
That said, one of the first things George Kay did to my moscode when he upgraded it was to upgrade the internal wiring. Of course the upgrade changed out dozens of parts (Caps, resistors, tubes, the input and output connectors), so I have no real way of knowing what the sonic impact of the wiring change itself was, but I was really happy with the overall sound improvement.
I tend to believe that the routing of wires/signals/power inside a component has as much, or more, influence on the sound of said component as/than the wires used. The routing of the power wires, input signal wires, and output signal wires, in the image you've provided makes me cringe. I would do my best to keep the various groups as isolated as possible, rather than bundling them all together as is shown above.
Look at the difference in length between those very short runs inside the amp vs. the multiple foot long runs after the binding posts.
Bryan
The wire inside definitely DOES make a difference. Steve McCormack found this out by changing out the 6" of stock wire from the output board to the speaker taps with higher quality wire. The difference was significant enough for him to charge (significantly) extra for it as part of his after-market modifications.
Remember ... EVERYTHING makes a difference, including the 1" fuse.
I am torn on this. I tend to agree with Bryan, that conductor specs like resistance, capacitance and inductance and probably the other exotic specs are all measured in units per length. From output transistor to speaker post is only about a foot in your amp. Some designers strive to minimize wire length on inputs and outputs.
BUT - the small amounts of resistance inductance and capacitance of plain or fancy wire are minute compared to the amounts contributed by voice coil and crossover parts, yet speaker wire still makes a difference. These illogical realities are what fuel the wire non-believers, and what makes it such a painful awakening to experience great wires for the first time. It shouldn't make a difference, and nobody can explain why it does. Or maybe it's more like nobody WILL explain. Why kill the golden goose?
Power wire is the same. Why not just solder single length of romex from breaker to power transformer? Switches, fuse and code are good reasons, but in theory a continuous length of romex with a IEC plug on the end should be better than adding 6 feet of aftermarket powercord, but is it?
Good wires seem to change the signal they pass in some way that makes it better. Or more likely they prevent the signal from being changed in a way that lesser wires do. That still doesn't explain the romex theory though. :duh There is more going on than is common knowledge.
No doubt, everything makes a difference, most of it is audible.
One of the biggest mistakes I see manufacturers of power-amps making is to under-size the wire gauge of power supply wiring and the wire connecting the output transistors to the speaker terminals. Having built a number of power amps over the course of my 30 plus years of involvement in this hobby I have found that the minimum wire gauge that will work is 14ga. and 12ga. is better. The gauge of the wire is even more important
than how little oxygen maybe present in the copper or the composition of its insulation.
Scotty
I agree with Rich that to one extent or another, dam near everything makes a sonic difference. But one thing we have all seemed to gloss over is the fact that every component is designed to a price point. Of course any designer would like to get the best sound he can for his product but if you end up tweaking this and tweaking that and making all of these little changes here and there all of a sudden your $1500 amplifier turns into a $2000 amplifier. And now you have to deal with the marketing folks as to whether that can sell a piece at that price even if it is better than the previous design. (Things like who else is playing in that space, would a piece at that price point cannibalize sales from other models you already sell etc.) Let's remember that while these may be audiophile companies they are also businesses and will not remain as such for long if they can't effectively market and sell their products.
I talked in my earlier post about the upgrades I did to my Moscode 600. But let's take a look at the economics involved. The amp had an original MSRP in the mid 80s of about $1600. Over the years it made multiple trips back to George Kaye for upgrades and by the time I was done I had put somewhere in the area of $1400 into it, close to doubling the cost of the amp. The amp sounded much better and I was not in the least unhappy with the value I got for the upgrade. (Each time I looked at the $400 -500 upgrade cost and compared it to what I could buy for $500 plus what I would have been able to sell the Moscode for on the used market and decided that the upgrade was the better way to go. Of course had I done all the upgrades at once and had $1400 plus the sale price to spend I might have made a different decision, but given the incremental way I upgrade the amp over ten years or so it made sense at the time. And by the way while $1400 might sound like a lot for upgrades, George's modification made very liberal use of many pricey parts like MIT Wondercaps and Edison-Price Music Posts. But the bottom line is that I went from owning am amp that cost $1800 to owning an amp that cost me $3200. Was it a better sounding amp? I certainly thought so. Could George have designed all of the mods into the original production version? Probably. (I'm not sure if all of the parts he used in the later mods were available in 1984, but I am sure he could have found something similar.) But the real question to George and Harvey Rosenberg as the worked on the original design would have been even thought it sounded better would the audiophile world in 1984 put up with a $3200 price tag on a hybrid amp? Obviously they thought that the original design was a better sound per $ value at $1800 because that is what they went to market with.
So while it is easy for us to say as users "if they (or we) only made this change, the piece would sound better", it is rarely that simple on the business side of the fence.
Wire conditions the electrical signal and therefore overall sound. If you wire straight to the amp's output transformers w/ no posts, you'll eliminate the conditioning of the internal wires and posts.
It's not like you can't hear the difference from an external link of cable because 1 wire is 'bad' and the other is 'good'.... It's not like a filter or funnel where there is 100% perfect that is limited by x% to yield what is possible. The sound is shaped/contoured by every path it takes, which is why everything makes a difference.
-C
I think its because people are drawn to look at the signal direction as source to speakers with this question. I think that signal direction should be looked at in the opposite directions. Speakers are a passive device and the last part of the signal chain. Your speakers sees everything infront of them combined. The speakers are the load. So if the load sees an immediate resistance in the form of lousy cabling with high impedance it will have an affect accross the output of the amp. The speakers sees down the line including the speakers cables, the amps and all its stages, the pre also and back to the source. This is the correct direction of electrical potential imo. So if you have a lousy cable the speakers have to drive those cables in a passive function.
One year of electricity in college ...... woot!