Irrational urge to bi-wire

[Covenant]

I tried it years ago and it did nothing but the manufacturer of my speakers unreservedly recommends bi-wiring. I have some nice silver cable going spare so its only going to cost a little time.The cable I use atm is Van Damme Blue 4mm.
Are there any members who consider they benefit from two runs of cable?

[Puffin]

Try it and see, it's the only way.

[hifi_dave]

The only benefit with bi-wiring is the removal of the cacky brass connectors usually used between the terminals. Replace those with a decent piece of wire and you've done the job for a fraction of the cost.

[brian2957]

I bi-wired my Tannoy 637s and it was well worth the effort :)

[Reffc]

No. there are no technical arguments whatsoever for biwiring making one iota of improvement, and in fact, it has been shown that it even increases measurable distortion (not audibly, but measurably, and this was demonstrated by Radford Revival some time back). Using heavier gauge for single wiring for longer runs if you must have more copper makes more sense.

Technically speaking, biwiring modifies the impedance with frequency seen as a load by the amplifier, and in some cases, this can modify frequency response. It is usually small by degree, but is there nevertheless. Typically, overall impedance drops at crossover frequencies, power response slightly increases and small anomalies in FR can occur (for say every 0.1R in series with the amp's output impedance you might see something like 0.1dB change in FR, so the results of biwiring are largely INAUDIBLE). Change single to biwiring and an independent load (cable impedance) is seen in series with the discrete speaker loads. The parallel combination is in series with the amp's output impedance, and at crossover, there can be a slight dip in overall impedance compared with a single wired system. The separate changed impedance loads overall change the roll-off profiles of the crossover slightly.

The exceptions to the rule do exist, which are crossover and load dependant, but these are not common place. For the most part, there are more disadvantage than advantages to biwiring.

There is also an argument that the more cables you introduce from amp to speakers, the more chance there is of RF interference.

However, some more unscrupulous cable vendors and speaker marketeers will push biwiring as it sells more cable, simple as.

[walpurgis]

I may be talking nonsense, but I've always wondered if bi-wiring or even tri-wiring and so on, affect the phase relationship between the drivers. Especially if differing lengths of cable are used. After all, no two cables are precisely the same length.

[Joe]

No. there are no technical arguments whatsoever for biwiring making one iota of improvement, and in fact, it has been shown that it even increases measurable distortion (not audibly, but measurably, and this was demonstrated by Radford Revival some time back).
[...]
However, some more unscrupulous cable vendors and speaker marketeers will push biwiring as it sells more cable, simple as.

So, what you're saying is that bi-wiring is voodoo?

[struth]

No your saying that

[petrat]

So, what you're saying is that bi-wiring is voodoo?

No ... voodoo works :eek:

[Barry]

No. there are no technical arguments whatsoever for biwiring making one iota of improvement, and in fact, it has been shown that it even increases measurable distortion (not audibly, but measurably, and this was demonstrated by Radford Revival some time back). Using heavier gauge for single wiring for longer runs if you must have more copper makes more sense.

Technically speaking, biwiring modifies the impedance with frequency seen as a load by the amplifier, and in some cases, this can modify frequency response. It is usually small by degree, but is there nevertheless. Typically, overall impedance drops at crossover frequencies, power response slightly increases and small anomalies in FR can occur (for say every 0.1R in series with the amp's output impedance you might see something like 0.1dB change in FR, so the results of biwiring are largely INAUDIBLE). Change single to biwiring and an independent load (cable impedance) is seen in series with the discrete speaker loads. The parallel combination is in series with the amp's output impedance, and at crossover, there can be a slight dip in overall impedance compared with a single wired system. The separate changed impedance loads overall change the roll-off profiles of the crossover slightly.

The exceptions to the rule do exist, which are crossover and load dependant, but these are not common place. For the most part, there are more disadvantage than advantages to biwiring.

There is also an argument that the more cables you introduce from amp to speakers, the more chance there is of RF interference.

However, some more unscrupulous cable vendors and speaker marketeers will push biwiring as it sells more cable, simple as.

It's not quite so straightforward as that: http://theartofsound.net/forum/showthread.php?5818-Basics-amp-General-Bi-amping-and-Bi-wiring

[Reffc]

It's not quite so straightforward as that: http://theartofsound.net/forum/showthread.php?5818-Basics-amp-General-Bi-amping-and-Bi-wiring

In your opinion Barry, not in mine. That link says nothing new or authoritative to make any sort of evidential based case for it, and it really is that straightforward in engineering terms; Bi-amping is another thing entirely. However, people hear what they want to hear and playing around with hifi is all part of the fun. Not really looking to get into a debate on it, but have offered some sensible, no-nonsense advice and explanation which can be taken at face value or ignored as one wants to. I have already commented that there are exceptions to the rule and these (I repeat) are largely crossover and load dependant. For a well designed/matched crossover, there are more drawbacks than merits for bi-wiring, and most engineers would agree that there's nothing of value to be had by wasting the money on the extra cable lengths.

[Stryder5]

I found that bi-wiring my speakers made a small but audible advance, bi-wiring and bi-amping using one amp for low frequencies and one amp for high frequency, made another advance in sound quality. I offer no technical answers for this, just my ears, my wife also hears this difference, I respect her comments as she is an opera singer of some note.

[struth]

Ive bi amped before and felt i got a small advantage, and also got mono blocks and find them good under right circumstances. Currently just use 1 in stereo mode. Like most things audio, there can be differences depending on systems , but deffo go with removing the usual brass link and using some cable, pref what your using.. Ive cut a bit off before making them up before to use. Think changing cables is perhaps more likely to give improvements for most.
Dont doubt the ones who have found benefit though, as its possible.

[DGP]

I've been using a passive bi-amp/bi-wire system for the last 25 years with twin Audiolab 8000Ps driving Tannoy Definition D500 with very early Cable talk (monstrous blue stuff like skirting board). I remember auditioning bi-wire options first and was not convinced. Bi-wiring seems to me to be very amp/speaker dependent - I'm not enough of an electronics whizz to know what connecting the two parts of the passive crossover back at the amp terminals does but Reffc's comments seem to chime with experience.
DGP

[Macca]

I found that bi-wiring my speakers made a small but audible advance, bi-wiring and bi-amping using one amp for low frequencies and one amp for high frequency, made another advance in sound quality. I offer no technical answers for this, just my ears, my wife also hears this difference, I respect her comments as she is an opera singer of some note.

I think with passive bi-amping it only makes a difference if the amps are at their limit so removing some of the stress on the amps will improve the sound. Although a tweeter is not hard to drive so even that is debatable - on paper at least.

Bi-wiring I did for years until I joined here and was told it was pointless. Now I mostly use vintage speakers so can't bi-wire anyway. I've also experimented with using wire jumpers instead of the brass jumpers - could not hear any difference.

[StanleyB]

Individual ground and signal wiring to different parts of a PCB circuit has shown to have great benefits. See star grounding. From a technical point of view, bi-wiring would keep the distortion from the two drivers away from each other, and termination them at the amps output, where the amp's feedback loop would stand a better chance of making corrections.
There have been tests that have shown that distortion at the amp's output is higher in bi-wiring. That is to be expected. In the normal wiring configuration the distortion feedback path from the two drivers are cancelling each other out in the cable on their way back to the amp. But by that time the drivers have already pumped out a distorted sound.

[YNWaN]

I can't say I have vast personal experience of bi-wiring, but I have tried it on a number of speakers. When I used Epos ES14's with Naim amplification I found it made quite a significant difference (which I preferred). Now I use Yamaha NS-1000M's I also run them bi-wired to the mid and tweeter though I haven't tried them single wired (the crossover is actually completely split and the bass is separately wired to another amplifier).

[Arkless Electronics]

Keep speaker cable thick and use the shortest lengths possible and there is no advantage to bi-wiring....

[YNWaN]

Well I use thick cables - they could just about be a touch thicker, but not easily.

[Arkless Electronics]

Thickest cable of shortest length means lowest resistance and hence maximum damping factor and least effect on frequency response due to interaction with crossover.

[anthonyTD]

Tend to agree!
I have experimented with Bi-wiring over the years, and although i found it did make a diffrence, i came to the conclusion that it was mainly negative.
Especialy if you use a diffrent type of cable for each driver...
Thickest cable of shortest length means lowest resistance and hence maximum damping factor and least effect on frequency response due to interaction with crossover.

[Arkless Electronics]

Tend to agree!
I have experimented with Bi-wiring over the years, and although i found it did make a diffrence, i came to the conclusion that it was mainly negative.
Especialy if you use a diffrent type of cable for each driver...

Ah well of course if you use a thinnish cable for one and a thick for the other small resistive differences between them will interact with the crossover etc to give a slightly skew whiff FR....

[anthonyTD]

:)
Ah well of course if you use a thinnish cable for one and a thick for the other small resistive differences between them will interact with the crossover etc to give a slightly skew whiff FR....

[Spectral Morn]

The only benefit with bi-wiring is the removal of the cacky brass connectors usually used between the terminals. Replace those with a decent piece of wire and you've done the job for a fraction of the cost.

+ 1

[Haselsh1]

I have tried bi-wiring my KEF Q500's and the sound was different but I would hesitate to say it was better. It was definitely different though.

[danilo]

Hmmm in mid 90's Having just bought a Pair of Arcam D290's ( Inty and Power units) I immediately tried the double run of Wire.
Hey! the sales man said; "s good!"
It made No differences that I could hear. Did make more of a wire mess that the Housemate complained about though.
Truth was the Arcams subsequently proved themselves to be poorly designed underperfoming amps.... Grrrr.
So in retrospect the Biwiring itself may not have been at fault.
No plans on repeating the experiment though.

[User211]

Tend to agree!
I have experimented with Bi-wiring over the years, and although i found it did make a diffrence, i came to the conclusion that it was mainly negative.
Especialy if you use a diffrent type of cable for each driver...
I found solid core on the ESL and multi-strand on the bass driver of Martin Logan Ascents to work well. Worth trying stuff like that if you already have the cables.