Hey Bigtee, good to hear from you. The arrows many times are simply there so that when cables are re-installed or used elsewhere, they are connected in the same direction in which they were broken in. On some interconnects, the shield is only terminated at the source so that RF is directed away from the destination. This technique was used on some Madrigal cables I had from the late 80s. (It fails misearbly for a F type video cable however). I have also heard that some cables sound better when oriented in the direction in which the copper was extruded. In any event, reversing cables is an easy tweak to test if you are not sure.
Another look at directionality in cables
A friend of mine and myself were discussing this subject. It was brought up, if a cable is directional, why would both arrows on the positive and negative point the same direction. It appeared that, for example, that the positive would point from the amp to the speaker and the negative should point from the speaker to the amp ( even though there is no positive and negative using AC-reference only for phasing). This way, since the signal alternates, that at least the signal would be going back and forth on the wire in the same direction at any given time(maybe.) I have discussed with engineers about wire and most agree that it does have a (marginally better at best) flow in one direction depending on frequency and wire structure. All agreed it was not significant.
My friend tried it and said he got better results with one wire going one way and the other reversed---go figure. Of course with some wire, you do not have this option with it.
Opinions?
My friend tried it and said he got better results with one wire going one way and the other reversed---go figure. Of course with some wire, you do not have this option with it.
Opinions?