To bi wire or not bi wire


Hello all,
I have a pair of B&W P6 speakers driven by a plinius 8100 integrated. 
The plinius has two sets of speaker outputs per channel and the B&W’s are biwireable. 
Would there be any benefit to running 4 separate cables? If so, any recommendations for cables?
The binding posts on the B&W’s make using spades difficult so banana’s would work better. 
Just asking this question because it would require a total of 24 feet of cable so it could get pricey real fast.
budget is around $500.
Thanks in advance
skipper320

Showing 2 responses by akg_ca


douglas_Schroeder nailed it....= no consensus on this question. 

thus is a well -travelled and oft repeated subject .

 AUDIOGON ( do a search for bi-wire ...)

CANUCKAUDIOMART
https://www.canuckaudiomart.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=52979

PINKFISHMEDIA/Audio
https://pinkfishmedia.net/forum/threads/connecting-single-cable-to-bi-wire-terminals.236240/#post-38...

In brief

(1) it is entirely system dependent.... and until you actually do an A-B bake-off... you won’t know.
(2) Some speaker manufacturers indeed do favour them (e.g Vandersteen ....) but some of the top cable manufacturers (CHORD, NORDOST....) favour a higher quality single run + jumpers as a better choice over bi-wires at the same price-point. See below
(3) BI-AMPING (with 4 separate cable runs... );;Different story.

E.g. NORDOST 
https://www.nordost.com/downloads/NorseJumperinstructions.pdf

CHORD
https://www.chord.co.uk/speaker-cable-guide/

".... Many hi-fi and home cinema loudspeakers have two pairs of binding posts. This allows the speaker to be either bi-wired using two sets of loudspeaker cable or bi-amped using two amplifiers.

As a general rule (and there will always be exceptions) we tend to find that bi-wiring will open out the sound stage and increase perceived levels of detail. However, single wiring will often sound the most musically coherent. There is also an issue with single and bi-wire speaker cables. In all the research we have carried out, a single wire speaker cable out-performs a bi-wire cable of equivalent cost. This makes a lot of sense; the single wire speaker cable has two high quality conductors and the bi-wire cable requires four. So for a given budget, we believe that a single wire cable will always out-perform the equivalent bi-wire cable, so much so that we no longer produce dedicated bi-wire cables..."

TAKEAWAY
Thus there is no silver bullet one size fits all answer.... full stop.

 


To the OP

Because cable audio performance and its overall system synergy (... or lack of it ...) is a well-travelled and oft-repeated theme that is always intuitively determined by the following two main factors in lock-step:
(a) cable selection and performance optimization is entirely your bespoke unique audio system dependent; 
(b) the unique warts in your bespoke listening environment (... as big a influencing factor as (a) above ...) 

Hence, it is impossible for outsiders to make any further comment over and above what has already  been offered up. 
You already have have numerous recent posts below on the same general theme. It’s now entirely up to you alone to experiment further in your system, especially as you appear to have already distilled your options down to your own personal faves. 

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/speaker-cable-help-4

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/speaker-cable-recommendation-6

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/speaker-cable-help-4

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/speaker-cables-for-vienna-mozart-speakers