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Cat 5 v. 10 GA Speaker wire

#1
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1/20/04 at 8:21am
  • Joined: December 2003
  • Post Count: 12
I have been reading alot about speaker wire recently and have found alot of information saying Cat 5 braided DIY wire makes a great speaker wire. What are the benefits of it over say some 10 or 12 GA soundking wire from PartsExpress? Thanks.
-Svence
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#2
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1/20/04 at 10:27am
  • Joined: September 2002
  • Post Count: 56
The only benifit I can see in the CAT5 is that you will develop strong fingers when constructing it. I'm not a big believer in the average person hearing any differences in speaker cables. The most important thing is that the gauge is adequate for the length of run. I currently use 18 gauge solid core wire for a 7' run.
But if you beieve you can hear the difference, give both of them try and decide on which sounds the best to you. The cost of the materials is very minor.
Happy braiding.
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#3
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1/20/04 at 11:36am
  • Joined: February 2000
  • Post Count: 155
Ditto what Michael said. I built some fancy bi-wire cables spinning 8 lengths of 16g wire into 4 cables for each front speaker. I flexwrapped each cable and carefully terminated the ends.

After swapping with my HD 12g, I could not detect any noticable change in sound characteristics. They look damn cool though!
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#4
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1/20/04 at 11:36am
  • Joined: December 2002
  • Post Count: 847
Chances are, in HT applications and short runs you wouldn't hear the difference and I don't even want to get into skin-effect or any of the esoteric stuff. If we're talking flea power to highly-sensitive extended bandwidth drivers then...
damn, I'd better quit now.
My hobby site
My commercial site
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#5
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1/20/04 at 3:36pm
  • Joined: December 2003
  • Post Count: 12
Thanks guys for all the quick responses...I guess I will just save myself some tired fingers and buy some 10 or 12 GA from partsexpress.

-Svence
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#6
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1/20/04 at 4:40pm
  • Joined: January 2004
  • Post Count: 143
Ummm...so why not save the shipping and buy lamp cord from Home Depot?

Damn! Now *I* better quit.
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#7
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1/20/04 at 6:13pm
  • Joined: June 2003
  • Post Count: 105
Found this here on the HTF (I think) the other day. It's and interesting read. Speaker Wire
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#8
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1/20/04 at 6:40pm
  • Joined: June 2001
  • Post Count: 7,270
Cat 5 makes great speaker wire. So does lamp cord, so does conventional speaker wire, so does Amphenol ribbon cable, so do a set of jumper cables. It's a lot of work for something that doesn't sound any different however if you've got a stack of it lying around and don't want to spring for <0.50 foot of something or other, then go for it.

"Thinking is what a great many people think they are doing when they are simply rearranging their prejudices."
- William James

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#9
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1/25/04 at 3:41pm
  • Joined: June 2000
  • Post Count: 119
Cat 5 is 8 strands of 24 gauge solid copper, making it equivalent in resistance to 18 ga zip cord.

Tom Rosback

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#10
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1/25/04 at 4:17pm
  • Joined: July 2001
  • Post Count: 1,591
I am using short lengths of 9-pair braided wires using Teflon Cat5 (15 awg) and I think it sounds a little better than 16 gauge copper wire. It was worth a couple hours of work. I previously had large cables (9 awg?) made from non-plenum rated wire, which caused some kind of minor distortion in the treble.
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