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A Perennial Debate For Which I Seek Help

Wire, Terminations, Dielectric, Solder, in summary, the linkages in our systems, the terminals in the path. Doubting your cabling can only lead to paranoia, and thus, fearing the snub of fellow audiophiles, you shun the Tuesday night shootouts, the gatherings that once made Tuesdays better than Fridays. Please, don't shun the shootout, I know of no gathering more intoxicating. They remind us we are alive and human, no mere beast in search of flesh and sustinance alone.

My Situation - I recently had a pair of speakers upgraded with new caps, chokes, posts, wire, etc... Not until I went to install the reworked crossovers, however, did I realize how cheap the connection was at the drivers. The woofer has a small terminal board mounted on the basket where the lead wires attach to two stamped rivets. The rivets and brackets are both loose. These clips are followed by a 3" wire to the woofer, some sort of tin-coated cotton or wiring of similar texture and tensility.

As for the tweeter, one of the even smaller pins used for the lead wires snapped off. I could try to solder it back on, yet more fundamentally, with all the money spent on speaker cables, IC's, perhaps hundreds on binding posts alone, aren't these shoddy driver terminations, hidden inside the cabinet, an egregiously weak link in the chain, or am I missing something specific about this particular connection? Any insight is truly appreciated.
nycwine1
markphd
667 posts
 
Perhaps this is why changing cables, interconnects, etc, makes a difference. If the inside was done really well, there wouldn't be anything to improve upon by changing the outside wires.
douglas_schroeder
3,281 posts
 
Markphd, poor logic. Like saying of a car, "If the engine in the car was better, there would be no point in changing the tires to performance tires."

Nycwine1,
Question: Is this supposed to be a "no compromise" speaker? Are your expectations for its construction/quality realistic? I ask because it's not too often that a speaker considered primo is ripped into for modifications. Is this a new, high profile speaker which has shocked you at the construction, or an observation about a speaker which is less than "only the best"?

My guess is there are a lot of ugly internals in many high end speakers, especially ones which are not going to be opened easily. Back to the car illustration; a lot can be happening under the hood.
markphd
667 posts
 
Douglas_schroeder, poor logic in your analogy.

My logic: Speaker: wires/connection internal...wires/connection external. The common denominator in the analogy is the wires/connection.

Your logic attributed to me: Car: engine...tires. No commom demoinator between the two as in my logic above.

You better practice your logical analysis a bit before you write the GRE exams.
baroque_lover
102 posts
 
I am glad this point has been brought up. After years of equipment swapping and cable testing I have come to the conclusion that most ‘audiophile’ cables are overpriced and superfluous.

For example, Totem’s design team utilizes14-gauge multi strand linearized oxygen-free, silver plated copper wire with thick Teflon dielectric shielding in all their designs—sound expensive, right? They build and test their speakers around this wire. They even use it in their speaker leads (which reinforces the fact that the posters speakers are poorly built). The best part is they sell it as ‘Tress’ for $5 a foot.

I wouldn't doubt that behind the pretentious 'jewelry' on most expensive cable is simple copper wire.

I also have a question for the Audiogon community. Why do we use connectors? Other than convenience and looks, what value does it add sonically? If the signal is only as good as its source, then why do we add one more conductive material in the signal path [that is different from the original]? It cannot make the sound ‘better’ because the signal it receives is what it is (the wire). I started thinking about this seriously after I read Lavardin recommends using bare wire for connectivity.
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