I believe this type of wire is superior than Zip Cord.

[Tony_Montana]

Zip cord is a good basic speaker wire which is cheap and widely available. But here are their shortcomings:

1. Susceptible to outside noise.
2. They radiate Electromagnetic Interference (EMI) into their surrounding since they carrying high power.
3. Inductance might be a problem for longer runs.

So is there a design that can over come above zip cord shortcomings? Sure is, and it is called Star Quad design.



Star quad is a 4 conductor design interwoven together uniformly(two for positive and two for negative). Because every conductor is located the same distance from the center, the opposing magnetic fields are canceled out so magnetic field radiation is attenuated greatly. Also due to 4-conductor style construction, the "loop area" between twists of the conductors are minimizes-thus reduces susceptibility to electromagnetically induced noise-and lower inductance.

Here is noise rejection capability of Star Quad design (Fig. 1) vs zip cord (Fig. 2)...noise was induced by coupled power cord.

Fig. 1

.
Fig. 2


As it is evident above, Star quad is much superior in rejecting electrical noises. And throw in the fact that they radiate less electromagnetic to its surrounding, and have lower inductance than a zip cord, one can see why they are superior.

And they are not that expensive (only $1.00 a foot if buying by bulk). Canare 4s11 have 4x14AWG cable resulting in 11 AWG paired.

[bturk667]

You'll see.

[skeptic]

This is the kind of nonsense I've been talking about.

"1. Susceptible to outside noise."

Is your speaker wire picking up outside noise? Here's a simple test. Turn off your amplifier. Put your ear up to your speaker. What you hear coming from your speaker is the outside noise the speaker wire is picking up. You say you didin't hear anything? That's because there isn't anything to hear.

"2. They radiate Electromagnetic Interference (EMI) into their surrounding since they carrying high power."

Here's another simple test to see if your speaker wire is radiating objectionable interference. Disconnect your speaker wires and connect them to an 8 ohm 50 watt resistor. Tape the bare wire so as not to risk a short. Turn on your amplifier and play music with the gain turned up. Bring the wire near a television picture tube (not a plasma or LCD display.) The distortion you see on the picture tube is the indication of the strength of the external field being created. Have to bring it right next to the tube to see anything at all? That's because the field is so weak as to be negligable.

3. Inductance might be a problem for longer runs.

They of course don't tell you the difference between the inductance per foot of their product versus say 12 gage zip cord. But if you knew it and knew the inductance of the speaker system you are connecting to you would see that by comparison the difference is insignificant. In fact the difference would only cause an increase of a few tenths of a decibel at 20 khz at best and this is inaudible.

Sorry no cigar for you Tony. This is an example of the technobabble I have been talking about in my other posts. They try to scare you into thinking that there is a problem you must solve and that this is the solution for it. BTW, $1 is much too expensive for this class of cable. I wouldn't pay more than about 30 or 40 cents myself.

[mtrycraft]

3. Inductance might be a problem for longer runs.

Skeptic reminded me that now Fred Davis paper on wire is available on line.

http://bruce.coppola.name/audio/cableInteractions.pdf

If you read it, you will find that he tested cables with 20X difference in inductance and you can follow the graphs how little that much difference makes.
Not much at all.

[Tony_Montana]

This is an example of the technobabble I have been talking about in my other posts. They try to scare you into thinking that there is a problem you must solve and that this is the solution for it.

The question is why should we have a problem [first] to seek a solution for it. Aren't we allowed to improve a product if there is something out there that is superior to what we are using?

The most notable quality of star quad cables are their noise rejecting [or emitting] capability which zip cord lack. A simple two conductor speaker wire such as zip cord will and do act like antenna and pick up all kind of noises, especially for longer surround speaker length. And the noise may find its way to back to amplifier although might not be hearable thru the speaker.

Although the listener will probably can not distinguish between zip cord or star quad, but two will have different noise figure if measured-as was evident by two graphs I posted.

If you look at the back of a typical HT set up, one will see sea of wires going everywhere , every direction and on top of each other. If we can find a way to cut down on interference created by wires (receiving or transmitting), then why not

[Tony_Montana]

Skeptic reminded me that now Fred Davis paper on wire is available on line.

http://bruce.coppola.name/audio/cableInteractions.pdf

If you read it, you will find that he tested cables with 20X difference in inductance and you can follow the graphs how little that much difference makes.
Not much at all.

Thanks Mtry, but i don't have Adobe reader installed so can't read your link

I saw an article in Audioholic that a 50 feet zip cord will have 1 dB drop in 20 kHz due to cable inductance. And I saw the formula that confirmed it. So if speaker wire is short this might not be a problem.

The superiority of star quad over zip cord was its noise rejection/emitting capability. Its lower inductance [over zip cord] is just icing on the cake

[mtrycraft]

Thanks Mtry, but i don't have Adobe reader installed so can't read your link

I saw an article in Audioholic that a 50 feet zip cord will have 1 dB drop in 20 kHz due to cable inductance. And I saw the formula that confirmed it. So if speaker wire is short this might not be a problem.

The superiority of star quad over zip cord was its noise rejection/emitting capability. Its lower inductance [over zip cord] is just icing on the cake

I am not sure but Adobe might be a free download?

Can you hear 20kHz?
Do you know what is the JND (Just Noticable Difference) at 20kHz? Me neither as the data is just not available to be established. First the treshold of detection about 100dB spl at 20kHz according to J. Stewart's AES paper of Meridian.
But JND is available at 16kHz , 3dB average, with test tones which is much more sensitive than music.

None of the cables plotted in the Davis paper drops off more than .5dB, or even less. He used 10ft cables.

And, now that I am reviewing his paper for the umpteenth time, Davis did plot two systems too, two amps and two speakers with these wires. Nothing new.

[FLZapped]

Zip cord is a good basic speaker wire which is cheap and widely available. But here are their shortcomings:

1. Susceptible to outside noise.
2. They radiate Electromagnetic Interference (EMI) into their surrounding since they carrying high power.
3. Inductance might be a problem for longer runs.

So is there a design that can over come above zip cord shortcomings? Sure is, and it is called Star Quad design.

Star quad is a 4 conductor design interwoven together uniformly(two for positive and two for negative). Because every conductor is located the same distance from the center, the opposing magnetic fields are canceled out so magnetic field radiation is attenuated greatly. Also due to 4-conductor style construction, the "loop area" between twists of the conductors are minimizes-thus reduces susceptibility to electromagnetically induced noise-and lower inductance.


And they are not that expensive (only $1.00 a foot if buying by bulk). Canare 4s11 have 4x14AWG cable resulting in 11 AWG paired.

Tony,

Star quad was designed specifically for balanced and differentially driven circitry(Usually just lumped togaether and callled balanced). As speaker cable, you would gain none of it's true benifits that other designs couldn't also provide.

It's application is found mainly in the pro audio realm for mic cabling and long line-level feeds.

-Bruce

[skeptic]

Although the listener will probably can not distinguish between zip cord or star quad, but two will have different noise figure if measured-as was evident by two graphs I posted.

If we can find a way to cut down on interference created by wires (receiving or transmitting), then why not

The answer is simple. Because buying something that is of no use is stupid. You could buy a 2000 watt amplifier, a car with a 700 horsepower engine, A house made from stone built to last 1000 years. You pay extra. A lot extra. But the added whatever it is, is worthless. Nobody has limitless money. Nobody just throws money away for no reason. Not even Donald Trump. Didn't you ever hear of the expression "if it ain't broken, don't fix it"? That's why I said it's a solution looking for a problem. Whatever theoretical problem it solves, in the real world, those problems don't exist. I could give you a hundred more hypothetical problems wires create that this one doesn't solve that others would. But they all create a new one. Less money to spend on other things. Things that really might be of some value.

[skeptic]

"None of the cables plotted in the Davis paper drops off more than .5dB, or even less. He used 10ft cables."

This is well within the unit to unit manufacturing variation of most loudspeakers, many amplifiers especially vacuum tube types, microphones, analog tape decks, phonograph cartridges. Now that we've nailed down 0.5 db loss at 20 khz by buying an expensive wire, what do we do about all of those other variables?

[mtrycraft]

Now that we've nailed down 0.5 db loss at 20 khz by buying an expensive wire, what do we do about all of those other variables?

Like what? Can you hear 20kHz?

[Bobby Blacklight]

But are the measurements relevant?? Do they represent the same conditions the product will be used at home. If the measurements don't correlate to an audible improvement in yours system, what do they mean?? If this gives you peace of mind and it's important to you for what ever reason fine.

[Monstrous Mike]

I think what you need to do is examine what kind of signals are being picked up by zip cord when it is acting like an antenna. For example, what can a 20 foot piece of zip cord actually pick up? Ifwe take the well known theory of a quarter wavelength being the signal that will be picked up the strongest, an 80 foot wavelength is a signal around 12 mHz (I just did quick math).

I just don't think that there would be any signals in the audio range that this wire would pick up, especially signals that were strong enough to be audible (i.e. in the audio spectrum) or interfere with the audio signals from the amp.

So getting back to skeptic's assertion, you would need to measure what kind of signals are present on a 20 foot piece of zip cord due to antenna effects, decide if any of them are in the relevent frequency band and then decide if they are of sufficient magnitude to be any sort of even a potential problem. I think you'll find the answers to this to be no, no, and no.

Therefore, even if a cable measures better than zip cord, using it will improve nothing that matters, and that is what sounds are coming from the speakers.

[skeptic]

If I owned a $3000 Bryston amplifier and someone wanted to convince me to buy a new power cord for $500 to $1000, what would they have to do to convince me? Measuring what interference got into the power cord wouldn't matter beans. I'd want to see what was happening inside the amplifier. I'd want to know how this translated into changes in the dc bias voltages, the noise and distortion, the frequency response. If there was a change, I'd be on the phone to Bryston to ask them what the hell they sold me with a power supply whose regulation and filtering is so poor that could be improved with a different power cord. Frankly, I'd be amazed if there was any change at all. It doesn't make sense.

BTW folks, don't try to shield your own power cords. The conditions of their UL listing will be violated as they are rated to operate in "free space." Putting any shielding on them such as aluminum foil or braiding will restrict air flow, decrease heat radiation, and create a safety risk.

[Tony_Montana]

All of you have good points regarding this type of wire, and I agree with "If ain't broke, then don't fix it" mythology, but if they help to "noise proof" a system, I say it wouldn't hurt. The only draw back here is extra cost associated wit this wire.

What is fascinating about this wire is that it does three things:reject outside noise, reduced emitting noise to its surrounding, and lower inductance. Certain applications might benefits from these advantages such as in wall long cable runs

[mtrycraft]

but if they help to "noise proof" a system, I say it wouldn't hurt. The only draw back here is extra cost associated wit this wire.

You are right, it won't hurt at all and maybe some may benefit from it having to place it near power runs that just cannot be avoided.
Most audiophile cables work. After all, they are wires making a complete circuit, no breaks but they don't make economic sense, for you.

[skeptic]

""If ain't broke, then don't fix it" mythology,"

It isn't mythology. It may be good marketing to alarm people to a problem that doesn't exist and then sell them a fix for it but it is bad engineering because it is a useless waste of money. Why not put your amplifier in a steel cage to protect it against a tiger attack. No tigers in your neighborhood lately? One was loose in Jackson Township New Jersey just about 5 or 6 years ago. Some crazy woman had a tiger preserve on her property but she claimed the loose one wasn't hers. Maybe a circus troupe passed through and one jumped out of one of the cages. You never know when it just might happen to you too.

[Tony_Montana]

Most audiophile cables work. After all, they are wires making a complete circuit, no breaks but they don't make economic sense, for you.

That is true, but most of them make claims that can not be confirmed objectively. But in case of star quad vs zip cord, its superiority can be confirmed and tested

It isn't mythology. It may be good marketing to alarm people to a problem that doesn't exist and then sell them a fix for it but it is bad engineering because it is a useless waste of money.

Well I wouldn't say that it is a problem that need fixing, but rather an improvement. Wouldn't you say that star quad is better than zip cord in some instances such as long runs or extremely noisy or sensitive environment? Mtry seem to think so

[mtrycraft]

That is true, but most of them make claims that can not be confirmed objectively. But in case of star quad vs zip cord, its superiority can be confirmed and tested


Yes, so the claim is the nake oil, not the wire as they work fine.