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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

Showing 1 response by baroque_lover

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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