Silver v Copper wire phono cable

@frogman

I am surprised you could be bothered with the experiment.

I am moving house and have been clearing out old gear. I have a Denon 103D purchased new hardly used. I was going to move it on but thought I should check it was all ok before selling. I got a hell of a shock as to how good it sounded. Too good to sell. I'm still listening to it 3 weeks later.

I think we forget how far our systems evolve over time when we are pushing the envelope.

@best-groove 

From your emoji I assume you have very good teeth.

Do you floss with silver wire as well.

Actually the most significant difference between the Reed 2G and 3P is that the horizontal motion bearings use a sapphire cup and needle point in the 2G, but in the 3P the horizontal motion bottom bearing uses magnetic repulsion. This allows for azimuth on the fly.

That means the 2G is mechanically grounded, whereas the 3P is not - its held up by magnetic repulsion.

Some folk report that the 3P sounds more natural (softer), but in my view the 2G

should be more accurate.

This whole conversation of silver versus copper is nebulous.

Far more important is the actual phono loom construction - for example, is the cable twisted pair plus shield ( my  preferred construct ), coaxial, balanced, etc

The electrical parameters which are determined by the loom construct and volume of wire will factor in to the performance - and will be dependent on the phono cartridge and phono stage.

For that reason any comparision between silver and copper are irrelevant unless the cable loom construction is identical in the comparision. 

For example for MC cartridges  I use MIT, but the cable is too capacitive for MM & MI cartridges. So for MM/MI cartridges I use an Audioplan silver cable ( that was never released due to cost ).

As far as internal arm wire anything with teflon insulation is too stiff. My preferences are Audio Note silver, Kondo silver, based on sound quality ( coherency & transparency ) and flexibility. There are other solutions not commonly used - for example the Naim Aro internal wire is shotgunned ( doubled up ) within the arm tube but retaining single wire format through the critical unipivot bearing. This is an example of a manufacturer wanting to achieve both flexibility through the critical bearings as well as an electrical model that is optimised.

The mechanical and electrical properties of the tonearm wire loom in toto are in the ways outlined above arguably more important than whether it is copper silver etc.

In fact nobody has talked about platinum, gold or bronze or ribbon vs round vs rectangular cross sections all of which are available as options.

@frogman

Dont forget that the 3 cables you compared AN, Cardas & Discovery are vastly different constructions - AN is a 3 wires litz per conductor, Cardas is a multistrand variable size litz, Discovery multistrand uniform size ( not sure if true litz ).And of course the insulation is different on all three cables.

@pindac

FYI - a few years ago I put some Furutech La Source 101 headshell leads onto my FR64S. This was one of the biggest surprises I’ve had in many years. I have been in top end audio for 30 years sold multitudes of top arms and rewired plenty.

I note that their cartridge pins are rhodium on phosphor bronze - they are exceedingly tight and I would check out if you can source some of those pins. I agree if you are using the AN wire the AN pins look very good. I like the crimped construction.

@terry9

The coils of the Rosewood Signature Platinum are made of 6N copper wire, painstakingly clad with a silver jacket.

So what - I have a Dynavector Karat Nova 13D and Ikeda Kiwame both of which have copper coils and piss all over the Koetsu Rosewood Signature Platinum for transparency and speed.

@mijostyn

I have not analyzed that from a mechanical perspective. Both metals are very ductile and malleable. Wires of similar gauge will be just as flexible.

Nonsense - copper is far less maleable and harder than silver given the same size etc.

@frogman

Silver is, verifiably, a better conductor than copper. Wires conduct. With all the concern over other minutia of differences in many other areas of system building and insistence that those minutia make audible differences (many do, IMO), is it not to be expected that the better conductor, WHEN PROPERLY IMPLEMENTED would offer superior sound, everything else being equal?

The best answer I can give you is possibly.

The second best answer I can give you is it depends ( upon your definition of "a better conductor" "properly implemented" and "superior sound").

I know of at least one manufacturer who uses copper in preference to silver on ground signals because they believe the "dirty cable" actually sinks noise & rf better than pure silver on the ground leg.

I pose a question for you to think about regarding speaker cables -

In a single ended amplifier the +ve signal is separated from the incoming mains by a transformer and the amplifiers power supply, whereas  the -ve signal is connected directly to the power pole on the street. Why would a speaker cable be constructed symmetrically when the +ve and -ve rails are performing different functions.