speaker cables vs speaker wire

[bigarchie]

Im just curious as to how much of a performance boost i could expect from switching from 12gauge OFC with banana clips on both ends to, say mid grade speaker cables. Just something simple shielded, probably with gold plated connections. I have a denon AVR 1803 hooked up to jbl S38II's, i have a jvc dvd audio/video player with optical interconnects as well as phoenix gold Arx.600 analog interconnects for the dvd audio. just curious, ive been thinking of upgrading speaker wire for a long time, but wasnt sure if it was going to be worth the money. I know when i upgraded from a smaller gauge copper wire, to a larger gauge ofc wire, imaging as well as bass was improved along with some clarity. probably a 6-9% increase in overall sound. any suggestions would be helpfull


muzicman

I just purchased some Meadowlark Swifts last week. I hooked them up with 16 gauge cable with no connectors. Hmmm. The sound was good, I thought. Then a couple of days later, I got this nagging feeling to check out some high-end cables on the net. I got really depressed. Wallet Rape! As expected, a lot of the "better" cables were worth more than my speakers.
I also noticed that a lot of people have jumped on the cable making bandwagon and are offering various products to the ever so eager market. Geez, what does a guy do? A few years back, I had the opportunity to compare Kimber 4TC to regular 16 gauge. I switched back and forth a few times...I was disappointed. The 4TC also went off to be compared on a friend's "high end" home theatre system. Same results. Kimber made bold claims regarding their cable...depressing. Maybe my equipment at the time, did not cut it resolution wise. Since then, I've upgraded my preamp, which was an Arcam Alpha 9C. I replaced it with a Bryston BP-25. Now there was a huge difference... no imagination needed. I've also tried Nordost Flatline for a few months as well as some Audioquest stuff.
The differences, if any, were always quite subtle. Not worth the extra cost, in my opinion.
Anyways, today I went out and bought some 12 gauge and some banana plugs. The cable was a reasonable 80 cents per ft. The sound...well, I think it sounds better...more body and treble detail...but who knows. Maybe the connectors are half the battle and not the actual wire? That's up for debate too...
Conclusion: It's your money, but as for me, high priced speaker cables make me and my wallet depressed.