Replacing Jumpers = Bi-wiring??

Hi Leafs: Long time no talk about bi-wire. I tried it with a pair of Castle Isis speakers and it did sound different than single wire, I didn't care for the sound though and preferred that of just using an additional piece of my Kimber Kable to jump the highs and lows. I ended up bi-amping the speakers for a short time (approx. one hour as my second new amp was not functioning properly and developed a very loud hum in both channels). The bi-amping even when using the internal passive crossovers made a very impressive improvement in the sound. I would suggest that people try bi-wiring in their setup to see if it not only makes a difference, but an improvement as well. It was easy for me to try though as I had purchased an additional run of cable with the intention of bi-amping. What I did not like about the sound of bi-wiring my setup was that the presentaion was less seamless. I can't imagine why this would be, but this is what I heard along with the increased detail. The speakers had their crossover at 3500 hz with 12db steps. This seems higher than the norm to me and may have been the cause of my displeasure, I don't know though.

As has been stated, the benefits of bi-wiring are system dependent and dependent on how you do it (internal or shotgun). With many speakers bi-wiring is beneficial. But I think the worst idea of all is shotgunning. I reckon getting a better cable is almost always better than doubling the runs. In many cases doubling the runs is worse even if you are not bi-wiring. I just want to also add that spending a lot on jumpers makes little sense to me because with many speakers you can open them up and reconnect the internal wires all to the one set of binding posts and do without the jumpers altogether, and get a better result.

A question was asked previously why aren't there more high-end speakers designs out there that are single-wired as opposed to bi-wirable. I think that most manufacturers offer two sets of posts on their speakers with the intention of bi-amping and not bi-wiring. Bi-wiring is usually a bad idea as it introduces undesirable effects like electomagnetic and RF interferences due to the two sets of wiring running in proximity, plus the benefits are questionable on a three-way design and non-existant in a two way design. 99% of the time you will be much better off investing the extra money in a better set of wires than bi-wiring. Happy listening.

It really depends. I recently upgraded speakers, the old pair sounded much better biwired. Upon setting up my new speakers with the same cables they sounded terrible. I was obviously dissapointed when my old speakers sounded a lot better in back to back comparisons. Then I set them up using a single wire and they now sound an order of magnitude better than my old speakers. I also upgraded the cable to Harmonic Tech from Kimber 8tc and the improvement is dramatic. The true test is through back to back comparison.

I have a pair of Sonus Faber Extremas. Not only did they sound better biwired but the biwire was one level lower then the single run with quality jumper.

The biwire was Mit MH 750 and the single run was Mit NH 750 Plus' yet the biwire sounded better.