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Longer speaker cables or interconnects

I have a feeling that this may be a topic that has already been discussed to death, but the only thread I’ve found so far is one at Stereophile.

I will I’ll be moving into my new home with a new semi dedicated semi anechoic listening room, and I am just realizing now that maybe the 25 ft speaker cable runs vs the 3 to 4 ft interconnect runs that I was used to in my old NYC loft for decades is maybe not the optimal ratio.

I presume that that I don’t want a long interconnect between the turntable and the preamp.

I’m looking for various points of views and justifications for them. Remember, one caveat is that I’m the kind of guy who will spend only a moderate amount of dollars for interconnects and speaker cable. Thank you all.
128x128unreceivedogma
cd318
2,636 posts
 
Seriously, if a cable can carry a signal for over a thousand miles without harm, what's a meter or two here and there?

Imagine the mileage of cabling they use to use in recording studios during the so- called golden age.

If Nat King Cole, Sinatra, Peggy Lee can sound that good 70 years ago under those conditions then its absolutely pointless to worry.

The OP is right to spend his money carefully on cables because no system ever built can yet improve on the original recordings. At any price.

Sometimes remastering from original sources can remove the smear imposed by too much mixing down / or by mastering from worn tapes. 

Regarding the isolation of your turntable you should try to enhance the decks ability to prevent outside resonance from interfering with the tracking. Hopefully, if its not a budget deck, the designer has already done most of the work for you.

geoffkait's avatar
geoffkait
23,365 posts
 
Imagine? Imagine is right. Your imagination is running away with you. 🏃‍♂️🏃‍♂️
dill
2,424 posts
 
"The speaker cable was close to the best that Monster - a new company at the time - had to offer in 1985"

Wow, that's old, has it turned green yet?

unreceivedogma's avatar
unreceivedogma OP
887 posts
 
dill,

no moisture. Sorry.

Old? The speaker’s serial # puts them at 1954, the year I was born. 

Now that’s old!
almarg's avatar
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almarg
9,670 posts
 
Unreceivedogma, it appears that your preamp provides two RCA outputs. "Output 1," at least in stock form, has an EXTREMELY high output impedance of 100K, that was apparently suitable for use with a matching Beard power amp, but very definitely would not be suitable for driving long cables or a majority of other amps. "Output 2" has a specified output impedance of 600 ohms, although I wouldn't be surprised if that number rose to considerably higher values at deep bass frequencies.

Also, it appears that your sub has an external crossover/amplifier, with a fairly low input impedance of 20K. I don't know what the input impedance of your amps may be, but I suspect it is relatively high.

Before providing any suggestions, my questions at this point are:

1)How are you connecting the OTL amps and the sub's crossover/amplifier to the preamp? If one is connected to "Output 1" of the preamp and the other to "Output 2," which is connected to which?

2)By any chance do you know if the capacitor upgrade that was performed on the preamp included the output coupling capacitors?

3)And if so, do you know what the values of the new output coupling capacitors are, i.e., the number of uF (microFarads)?

4)If you know the input impedance of the amps, that would also be relevant information.

Also, a minor correction for the record, if I may: The musician you referred to is Al Kooper, not "Cooper." As you may be aware, also, prior to his BS&T days he was a member of the Blues Project, a great group IMO!

Regards,
-- Al
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