using car audio cable for ht (1 Viewer)

[Christ Reynolds]

i was an installer for a couple years, and i acquired a shitload of car audio speaker wire (in the order of hundreds of 50ft rolls), and ive been using it for my HT setup. i dont have nice speakers yet, but when i do, should i upgrade my wire to "HT" wire? for my front 3, i'm using rockford fosgate 12ga wire, and the sides and rears i'm using rockford 14ga wire. if it will make a difference, i'll get new wire with the speakers, i like to do things the right way, and when i have the money, thats what i'll do. but i dont want to spend more than i have to, especially when i have possibly over a mile of this shit lying around my attic. any help or links would be appreciated. happy holidays.

CJ

 

[RussKon]

you are about to open a whole line of discussion about the merits of "wire"....

my opinion...fwiw....no difference...copper is coopper...alot of people will have differing opinions...but you will have no problem using your wire...

russ

 

[Christ Reynolds]

you are about to open a whole line of discussion about the merits of "wire"

thats what i didnt want to do, ive read those discussions before, and they never go anywhere. basically, when i get good speakers, i'll try out some 'good' speaker wire. if i hear a nice improvement, i'll keep it, if not, it goes back. basically, i was indirectly looking for someone else who has used car audio wire before.

CJ

 

[george.Legeza]

I've used some 12ga car speaker wire for my radio/music setup in the past and I really didn't notice any difference when I "upgraded" to HT speaker wire. The only real bonus for me was that the car audio wire had a cheesy blue cover and the HT wire blended in with my walls better. Copper is copper and it really shouldn't make all that big of a difference especially since most car audio speaker wire is fairly high quality.

 

[Chu Gai]

Provided you've made good solid connections, and I rather suspect you will given your experience, the answer is the wire you've got is fine. It'll be fine with the speakers you have now, and with the ones you'll have years from now. It'll be fine if you dropped $100 for them, and it'll be fine if a pair of $10,000 speakers fell into your lap. Controlled testing, that involves situations where one takes two wires...any two wires...that are of similar lengths and similar gauges has indicated, and continues to indicate that individuals can't tell the difference between them. The nature of this controlled testing is quite simple. The levels to the speakers are matched and at no time does the listener know the identity of the wire through which the music is being played. Contrast these results where the listener knows the identity and biases come in to play. At the very least this should suggest to you that audible differences between wires are miniscule at best although prices are not in proportion. Save your money, use your speaker wire, even your interconnects if you have them, and go out and spend it on better equipment or a little bit of room treatments.
On the other hand, if you feel a strong necessity to be charitable to poor speaker wire assemblers (manufacturing is too kind of a word at least IMHO) then this being the holiday season, by all means 'invest' in audiophile hyped wires.

 

[Danny Tse]

I used Esoteric Streetwire 12 Gauge speaker wire (the black ones from Crutchfield) in my previous system for about 10 years, and I have no problem at all. Super flexible as hell and very inexpensive. Interconnects for car audio is good for HT as well.

 

[Greg Kolinski]

Forgive me if i'm wrong,but if it's the proper gauge and made of good copper,it will work fine.I dont believe the reciever will find out you are using "car"wires " .Myself,Iv;e bought some pricey monster cable interconects,s-video,digital cable ,and componant,works good,but mostly for the thick shielding and tough build quality to protect it from the wifes cats .For speaker wire I got the middle of the road monster/radio shack ,etc.works great for me.

 

[George Martin]

Christ, I am currently using Lighting audio 16ga. speaker wire for my surrounds and have not noticed any problems. I was using MTX 12ga. for my mains and center. The shop (car audio) I work for recently became a monster dealer so I tried some of the 16ga four conductor. I paired them up and ran a line to each of the front speakers I have yet to hear a differance. So I will say Car audio speaker wire is pretty much the same as home speaker wire.

 

[Christ Reynolds]

great, thanks everyone for the replies

if you feel a strong necessity to be charitable to poor speaker wire assemblers (manufacturing is too kind of a word at least IMHO) then this being the holiday season, by all means 'invest' in audiophile hyped wires

hmm, dont know if i feel THAT generous this season, hopefully not next year either.
CJ

 

[Chu Gai]

what is it about cats and wires...happened to my kid with his new cat?