Bi-wire Cable Choices?...

Keeping my commitment to report back on my opinion of Canare 4S11 Star Quad Speaker Cable.

I finally connected the Canare 4S11 today and so far the going is really good, sounding better than the Monster Flat cable as well as the German Powerline Studio speaker cable I was using before.

It has better bass in my opinion and it is not sounding grainy or bright in my system. I am saying this based on my impressions vis a vis the cables I was using before and not in general. I will give it a good listen in the next few days. I am very optimistic that it would stay in my system for a while.

I recently added Canare 4S11 to my system, replacing standard Monster Cable. My cable lengths are around eight feet. I am going from straight wiring with MC to bi-wiring with the 4S11. I find the mids and lows to be less congested, tighter, and cleaner. One could perceive this as a loss of bass because the bass and low mid does not resonate as much and crowd the soundscape. To me this is not a problem, but a solution. Even at low volumes, I hear my low end with precision. However, you could say that the bass is not as strong until I turn the volume up on my amp.

How much of this is going from straight wire to bi-wire and how much of it is the quality of the Canare cable I cannot say. I can say that my little bang for the buck system sounds great to me, even compared to systems that cost six times as much, and at 69 cents a foot the Canare cable is an amazing bargain.

I might try the bi-wire mod prescribed at audioasylum some time soon -- they say that bridging the negative cable posts can eliminate some of the problems caused by bi-wiring.

Mrpapa,

You wrote:

"bridging the negative cable posts can eliminate some of the problems caused by bi-wiring"

That sounds very interesting, could you please post the link to the thread? I am keen to find out the details.

Thanks

http://www.audioasylum.com/audio/tweaks/messages/110806.html

I guess the premise is that having a common ground reference point at the speaker instead of back to the amp increases the coherency and reduces diffusion? Anyway, it seems reasonable. Here are snippets from some experimentors:

"The traditional biwire has a bit more sparkle, and slightly meaner, leaner bass. Traditional also has better imaging, with the instruments more separated along with a better perception of depth.

The tweaked setup is a tad more dull with the instruments grouped more tightly together. The bass is not as lean and mean, but the fullness may be quite welcome in some systems. Overall, there is a better sense of coherence to the music (it's probably due to the type of recordings I tend to listen to - mostly moderate rock where all tracks are recorded individually and each track often has slightly different ambience), but it is a strage effect to try to describe. Even though I describe the tweaked setup as having more coherence, I would not call it more musical than the traditional setup. "

Here's another:

"a more relaxed sound quality, a more coherent, flowing sound to the music, a more natural soundstage. The presentation is "less hifi" (for lack of a better way to put it!), and things sound more... "natural", to me. Try it, you might like it... "

And a third:

"That is because with fully isolated bi-wiring, the ground reference point for each crossover section is all the way back at the amp terminals through the seperate speaker cables, and connecting a jumper (not necessarily the oringal brass POS jumper that came with the speakers either, a bare solid copper wires often works better.) between the two ground terminals asures that each section sees the same ground reference point, as it has been commoned at the speaker, and the impedance back to the amp halved.

See also:
All about bi-wiring, the hows and whys
http://www.geocities.com/jonrisch/biwiring.htm
AND
http://www.geocities.com/jonrisch/biwiring2.htm
http://www.geocities.com/jonrisch/biwiring3.htm
and
Latest Flash on bi-wiring:
http://www.AudioAsylum.com/audio/cables/messages/13441.html

for more info re this subject."

Mrpapa,

Thank you for the link I shall go through it later in the day.