Sorry, Somehow my question ended up in the speaker category, obviously it belongs in with the cable discussions.
Speaker cable arrows???
I bought a used pair of Silverline Audio's Conductor cables. Plugged them in
and was very pleased with the neutral sound I was getting. Bare wire to the
speakers, and bananas on the amp end. Then I realized that the arrows on
the cables where pointing towards the amp. OOPS, I reversed the path
direction, and couldn't hear any difference. Zero.
My preference would be to have the bananas on the amp end.
Can I disobey the arrows, and run the cables effectively backwards?
and was very pleased with the neutral sound I was getting. Bare wire to the
speakers, and bananas on the amp end. Then I realized that the arrows on
the cables where pointing towards the amp. OOPS, I reversed the path
direction, and couldn't hear any difference. Zero.
My preference would be to have the bananas on the amp end.
Can I disobey the arrows, and run the cables effectively backwards?
186 responses Add your response
Hilarious. Stop. Guys. Seriously. You’re killing me here. First of all, it won’t hurt anything. At all. Impossible. If you hear no difference run them whatever way you want. Not all cables are directional. At least not always to the extent its obvious to everyone. Obviously. Cables that are directional are directional. Does not matter how they are hooked up initially, or for how long, or anything like that. They simply sound better one way than another. Always. Permanently. Cables that aren’t directional may be marked directional by manufacturers that know that is just the kind of thing certain audiophiles will notice, whether they are able to hear these kinds of things or not. |
The difference of "directionality" may be subtle, so you may need some pretty high end system to tell the difference. For most systems, however, the difference may be too small to be audible. If anything, the arrows serve to let you know the cables are hooked up consistently either at the amp or speaker ends. |
I know this for sure, if the cable comes with a project box and or a lump or a bump in the run, direction does matter.. Will it harm anything? NO. Will it change the way it works? YES, Will it change the sound, YES. If the cable has a high pass filter, hooking it up backwards, reversing polarity, would turn the High pass filter into a low pass filter. Think about that one. A resistor and cap from pos to neg = a 6 db HP first order filter. If you reverse it, it becomes a cap and resistor, network. 6 db LOW PASS first order filter. That network would burn out in about 30 seconds @ 20 watts....(depending on the component ratings) Second the inductor in a network cable on the pos leg would then be on the neg leg, what would that do?.... I duno.. If it's not a network cable, one way, MAY or MAY not sound better after it settles in. The cable is all ready broke in (so to speak) so it need to settle in a bit and flow in "a" direction.. The cable will sound better in hours or days as opposed to weeks or months. Direction matters Be aware static discharge to the cable ends can screw thing up to.. cover the ends of unused cables. Ground yourself OUT.... Then do your work.. A simple 5 second process that VERY few observe... Why do it? It adds to the longevity and quality of the cable being installed. Handle your cables with care.......Hook the speaker end first, (why? no place for the discharge to go, if the other end is still covered) then Discharge yourself on the preamp, phono ground, unwrap the cable end and plug in. Ok 22 cent worth....or 2.22... Regards |
Since all wire is inherently directional 🔜 speaker cables, internal speaker and electronics wires, inductors, transformers, digital cables, HDMI cables, fuses, ribbon connectors, capacitors, resistors, et al should be controlled for their inherent directionality during manufacture. The industry, sadly, moves at a snails’s pace. It probably hasn’t even got the memo yet. 🐌 If everything was in the right direction the audible effect of reversing one cable wouldn’t be subtle then, would it? |
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If everything was in the right direction the audible effect of reversing one cable wouldn’t be subtle then, would it? This is ancient history, but the story goes Ted first noticed not every spool of wire of the same spec from the same supplier sounded the same. Looking into it he learned details of wire manufacture previously thought irrelevant did in fact affect the sound quality of the wire. One thing led to another and soon they were making more consistently better wire. Around the same time he was listening and noticing the wire did sound better one way than another. No Ted was not the only one to notice this, he's just my example. You tell your story with your examples I'll tell mine with mine. Okay? Sorry. That was for the Ted haters. You know who you are. Now before Ted went to the time and trouble to test and listen and figure all this out wire was assumed to be the same from spool to spool and regardless of direction. No one bothered to test and listen and so the wires went every which way. Seeing as even something as simple as a speaker cable has at least two wires then when nobody cares there's a pretty good chance L could be one way R the other, or + one way - the other, or both, or neither. It was all random chance. Its like this still today. Even though this story goes back to the 1980's. Forty years ago. Hence my Twilight Zone remark. This is how far behind the times it is to question directionality. And yet many manufacturers (and audiophiles) are indeed that far behind the times. So of course they get their random wire chaos and cannot hear any difference. Not because the wire isn't directional. Because they never bothered to figure out which direction is better. If they had the difference would not be subtle. Not at all. |
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djones511,895 posts05-11-2020 3:56am Doesn’t matter. It won’t matter if you can’t HEAR the difference. I do believe that is the point. Some people can hear the difference and some can’t. Still doesn’t change the fact for those who can. Some folks need to wear corrective eyewear, WHY? They can’t see as well without them.... Not hard to see the correlation, but it sure seems hard for the "Doesn’t matter group". Ask a lefty why they can’t throw the ball right handed, because they can’t (very well). Same with hearing... I have two arms two legs, just like MR weight lifter, why can’t I bench 350 lbs? I have two arms, and two legs. We’re not all able to hear so good. My LF hearing is taking a shi#. Bummer, I don’t get to hear the neighborhood BOOM BOOMs as well. LOL My sub system is working great, how well do I feel it through my feet, my bottom, about 30 hz and down...Pretty good... Before saying it makes no difference, go get a hearing test, 50-350.00 USD. Even free some places... Start there.. If you come back good, go see a shrink, they’ll help with the denial thing....LOL Don’t get all upset at me now... I got my own issues... Respectfully and with regard... |
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You guys are hilarious. Speaker cable directionality - it IS possible to intentionally design and construct a "directional cable", but not as a passive device. Think about it: does your directional cable possess differing impedance in either direction? If so, how is that accomplished? (hint - it's not). Then there is the issue of signal to your speakers being AC, not DC as is commonly thought. Again, please explain to me exactly how you can create or maintain directionality in an AC line? |
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That doesn’t make sense because there are two wires in the AC circuit, not just one. The signal must be traveling down one wire to the speaker while it travels in the opposite direction on the other wire. And vice versa. The signal can’t be traveling opposite to the direction of current and voltage in a wire, can it? That’s why both wires in the cable should be controlled for directionality, such that when the signal is headed to the speaker it’s going in the direction of least resistance. |
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I don’t think you understand how electricity works. No offense. I don’t think the other gentlemen do either. It is the current that moves the speaker diaphragm as explained below. “The voice coil component of a speaker is actually just an electromagnet. Electromagnets are coils of wire, and they're normally wrapped around some kind of magnetic metal, like iron. By running an electrical current through the wire, you produce a magnetic field surrounding the coil; this field magnetizes the metal in the middle creating north and south polar orientations. The difference between an electromagnet and a permanent magnet is that you can switch the polar orientations on an electromagnet by reversing the current's flow. Stereos use this property of electromagnets to repeatedly reverse the electrical flow. The amplifier switches the signal over and over, making the red output wire on the stereo switch between positive and negative charges. The voice coil's electromagnet is placed within a permanent magnetic field. The two magnets interact, and every time the electromagnet's polarity changes, the interaction between the magnets changes. When the magnets are repeatedly repelled and attracted, they move the coil back and forth quickly, kind of like the piston in an engine. The moving coil presses and pulls on the speaker cone and vibrates the air in front of the speaker. This creates sound waves via a driver that vibrates the diaphragm.” |
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geoffkait21,656 posts OMG Have I created a Frankenstein monster? Have I been cloned? It’s like looking in the mirror. 👀 |
Mr. Geoffkait, I don't think it best to quote HowItWorks articles that poorly quote Wikipedia. The result can be less than coherent. Take this sentence, The voice coil's electromagnet is placed within a permanent magnetic field. The two magnets interact, and every time the electromagnet's polarity changes, the interaction between the magnets changes. The voice-coil is the electromagnetic, and the voice-coil's magnetic field interacts with the permanent magnet field. Perhaps that is what they meant, but you get the impression they didn't really understand it. The signal energy travels down the cables in one direction >>>> from the source to the load, (amp to speakers), in the form of an electromagnetic wave. That is not really true and is shown not to be true with a simple case, a DC voltage and a load. There is no continuous electromagnetic wave to transfer energy. What there is is an electromagnetic field that cause electron movement with causes a magnetic field. The product of those two (power) always points to the load which is the direction of power transfer. In a transmission line, the changing e-field causes electrons to move which propagates down the cable as an electromagnetic wave, but technically, other than losses, no work is done. The "wave" sets up the fields, but does not define the transfer of energy ... at least using classical EM theory. |
geoffkait, "Glubson, did you take a smart pill placebo?"I, in fact, noticed and explained those teeth on April 22. I told you that you will get it a few weeks later. Anyway, so you have something to reveal to your readership in a month or so. The secret in those teeth amplitudes increasing recently is in reporting logistics and death distribution. New York State has a very well organized system, augmented during recent circumstances. Many other states do not have it organized that well in real time so you get dips during the weekend. When proportion of deaths in New York was overwhelming, delays in reporting from other states were much less prominent. Once proportion of New York state deaths decreased, imperfections in reporting dilligence in other states became more visible. You are welcome. |
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