Bi-wiring DOES work if you have external crossovers.

[Chris]

As an electronics expert, I make a good plumber so what about wide band noise getting back from cones´ action etc. to the crossover components but down the wires somehow and not only through microphony. As simple as longer length wires means less negative effect ? Do cones retrogenerate electrical noise he says running out to buy 20m extra speaker cable. This would also help explain why sound through my headphones has always been better than through my speakers but the gap is much tighter now. Told you I was a romantic plumber.

[Stratmangler]

Do cones retrogenerate electrical noise he says running out to buy 20m extra speaker cable

Back EMF?

[Arkless Electronics]

It's technically no different to bi wiring.

[Chris]

But for some reason sounds a zillion times better.

[Chris]

Hi Mark,

What if you just did a lash up to extend the length of the cables between tweeters and crossovers and mids and crossovers to simulate more physical distance ? By default everyone uses the shortest cables poss. Just to see if you hear something. Yes, I know it´s crazy.

[CornishPasty]

By default everyone uses the shortest cables poss.

I've tried my IMFs both ways ie long interconnects, short speaker leads and visa versa and I prefer them with long speaker leads. I can also understand the system sounding different (I can't say better as I haven't tried it) with long speaker leads after the crossover. The speaker leads will have a certain inductance and dc resistance and this is now on the output side of the crossover. I'm only surmising of course.

[walpurgis]

I only actually need about 2.5m speaker leads, but generally use around 4.0m leads. I like a bit of leeway to move speakers and route leads. Can't say I've heard any difference using short or longer leads of similar type.

(by the way. I've come across some great sounding speaker cable. Transparent Audio Musicord. It's not desperately expensive, but it is pretty hard to track down. It's fairly slim and looks like strimmer cable, but really sounds fine. Very open and no harshness at the top. Works wonderfully with my Tannoys. Worth finding)

[danilo]

Isn't the Only relevant factor of a Speaker wire it's Resistance ? Remembering that it's a Power feed.
Presumably the OP had the worst/most resistive wire on the Planet pressed into use as Speaker wires.
Not many other possible explanations that are not into 'betwixt the ears' subjects.

[Reffc]

Just to enter the fray, it is NOT a great idea to move external passive crossovers as far from the speakers as possible (ie back to the amp) and there is no "wide band" coupling from speaker "cones" to passive crossovers placed close to speaker enclosures. Too many assumptions being chucked about folks.

The reason you ought to keep external crossovers close (ish) to the enclosures is that the further away you move them, the more chance of altering the voicing because you are unnecessarily introducing a greater length of reactive capacitance and inductance from a filter which should, as far as is practicable, be placed as close to the driver as possible because the whole point of a passive crossover is to act as part of the electrical load on the drive unit to accurately shape the acoustic response to the desired shape and phase alignment. For all practical purposes, just outside the enclosure is usually the best place.

Bi-amping does nothing magic to a speaker's response and the only obvious benefit is that bass damping factor can be improved where you have longer cable runs, but equally, just stepping up to the next cable gauge size does the same thing. In theory, single wiring also offers less crossover distortion by introducing some electrical damping between cone and woofer, depending on the design.

That all said, run with whatever you prefer the sound of as there's no right or wrong, but it is not correct to make assumptions based on assumption or what others have written on t'ut interweb!

[Virtual-Symmetry]

Why don't people build proper active systems any more? [I don't mean speakers with built in class D power amps]