No ! Many non bi-wire speakers can be designed with an L pad in the midrange and or tweeter circuit. In the Vandersteen 2 and 3 they are very carefully deployed with a very high quality device that should not be used frequently as one might a tone control. The range is significantly less than available via most tone controls. You can read more by downloading a manual from the Vandersteen website.
finally, at least for Vandersteen IF you wish to preserve time and phase, do NOT use a different wire for the two legs of the Biwire!!! a notable exception is the new Audioquest wire that has the RF trap on the bass.
Amplifiers are more susceptible to impedance variations than we think, even in solid state. I think we are hearing these changes, and when you bi-wire you, perhaps to a very small amount, are changing R, L and C.
Now, the question, _if_ I am correct, and _if_ it makes a difference, is this small change worth $5? I have no idea, but have you thought about room acoustics?? ;-)
When I build bi-wire terminals on speakers, it is only with bi-amping in mind. Why would you add 8ft of speaker wire, rather than 3 inches in the crossover?
FYI, whenever these discussions come up I think of MIT cables, who put crossover components into their little black boxes. Clearly, a little inductance and capacitance in the cables seems to have sold many a listener.
Your post reminds me of the $2 wine tasting we did a few years ago. In the end, it came down to a contest between Thunderbird and Ripple (with Midnight express as a third-party candidate).
I personally preferred the Ripple, but my Marketing partner was a strong proponent of Thunderbird. While my boss, a purported oenophile leaned to Midnight Express (while refusing to taste any of them) on the grounds that the label was more attractive.
I suspect that any of the 3 finalists would have improved the quality of my sound system. But I take exception to Glenlivet being mentioned in this context. Scientific tests have shown that a few drops applied to your speaker terminals and a few more to your tongue, create a dramatic improvement to your system.... no 'beliefs' here -- just hard science!!
I must say that I don't get the bi-wiring routine. It seems to me all that is being accomplished is adding more connections (points of failure). If you have good speaker cable to begin with doubling it does virtually zero. The signal still has to go through the passive crossover with its inherent flaws. The amp is still going to feel the back EMF of the woofers. Oh well. Some things should just remain mysterious to me.
@ieales Thank You for the link, I read it yesterday , very interesting .
The question is does it improve the sound ? i.e. does the sound stage increase , get deeper , do you have more of a 3D effect , is the music clearer or sharper ? I asked the question because I can't ( as a retired biomedical equipment technician ) grasp why it seems to sound better to many who have tried it ( without increasing the overall awg ) , but I had the same feeling about power cords and outlets until I tested and heard the improvements so I am curious about bi-wiring .
@ieales "
^^^^ typical post of someone reading the title and inserting their 0¢.
'Good' speaker wire is meaningless. The cable is part of a system and $$$ is often sonically and measurably worse than ¢¢¢."
I've been called many things but "typical" is not one of them. A first! I don't understand your second and third sentences quoted above. Please educate me.
Lastly, in the spirit of banter, by "good" I mean that the owner of the rig and cables thinks they are "good" and I don't see how that is meaningless.
Funny, I feel the same about people who link to their blogs to appear erudite but then make fundamental errors or overly simplified generalizations that result in the wrong conclusion most of the time ... Hint, is the emitter resistor in the feedback or not?
^^^^ typical post of someone reading the title and inserting their 0¢.
Let's face no one knows why bi-wiring improves sound quality. Not one single credible explanation offered so far.
Some consumers (and importantly also reviewers) seem to believe that it does, and prefer to buy loudspeakers which provide this option. Some manufacturers may therefore feel compelled to provide this option due entirely to these marketing pressures and little else.
On the other hand many believe it doesn't - including those manufacturers who on principle don't even feel it relevant enough to allow their users the opportunity to try it out.
Some might even be of the opinion that bi-wiring actually makes the sound worse.
Cable manufacturers and dealers on the other hand....
Historically this was never provided for bi-wiring, it was provided for Bi-Amping to reduce IM distortion and/or tailor amps to frequency range.
Some consumers (and importantly also reviewers) seem to believe that it
does, and prefer to buy loudspeakers which provide this option. Some
manufacturers may therefore feel compelled to provide this option due
entirely to these marketing pressures and little else.
Hmm, nobody took a note of the posted link in this thread. That explains why bi-wire works and the science behind it. With measurements, graphs and all. Rather clever test track and method they have composed to use to be able to measure and show the effect of Intermodulation in a same cables single (wires) configuration and in bi-wire configuration.
It is making a scientific proven difference but if it is detected by ear or not. That are determined by several OTHER factors. So audiophiles that are able to hear the benefits have some of the other factors aligned (room, speakers, gear and so on).
Used test method:
Notes
The test tone CD was played using an all in one CD player/amplifier set at half volume into a pair of floor-standing speakers. The current probe measurements were analysed using TrueRTA via a Tascam US144 USB audio interface. The single wired measurements were taken with two runs of speaker cable wired in parallel (speaker shorting pieces in place) and the bi-wired measurements were taken using the same arrangement with the shorting pieces removed. In this way both measurements used the same cross-sectional area of cable to eliminate any effect of lower resistance on our measurements.
There is a couple of analogies that are used in the explanation. That is needed for me anyway to be able to grasp the complex working of it. That may need to be re read and let sink in.
So we see that there is much more than some false logic that will cloud our thinking and make the individual more comfortable to put for example this specific effect aside. When it is not properly understood or known.
1) Where is the detailed equipment review. They say a "floor stranding speaker", then link to their Q40, but don’t explicitly say that is the model used, but then make a statement in the report about "Secondly at and above the typical cross-over frequency of 1 – 2 kHz, the intermodulation distortion has been reduced by up to 30dB.", -- BUT-- the speaker they linked to has a 2.3KHz crossover frequency. (The cross-over order has an impact on the back-EMF as well).
2) I couldn’t find any mention of the speaker wire used. Weird, really really weird in an article about Speaker Wire.
3) Very strange the amplifier is not listed, since this is pretty critical for a test like this. If I go out of my way to choose an amplifier with a really poor damping factor, then back EMF from speakers will have a bigger effect on the other speaker single or bi-wire, but you could make the differences larger with high damping factor. Weird to use what sounds like a "cheap" CD player/amplifier. Why not use high quality amplification?
4) 0 mention of the current probe and/or current probe amplifier used, hence no ability to validate it’s measurement performance and what it’s IM distortion is.
5) The unforgivable mistake of not measuring IM right at the drivers, after the crossovers, with single and bi-wire, which is the only proper way to isolate IM between single and bi-wire. (or better yet measure the IM at the output of the drivers).
6) Their claim of "IM" reduction is FALSE, and CANNOT be concluded, since they are not comparing what actually goes into the tweeters / woofers, but what they measured on the cables. IN FACT, if you add the Red line from Figure 6., to the Green line in Figure 7 (the two biwired measurements), you essentially get the same as the Blue line in Figure 6/7, especially where you would most expect it, i.e. 1-3KHz, in fact, not essentially the same, but almost exactly the same. That tells me that their claim in Figure 6 of reduced IM distortion (to the tweeter) is false since they have not established any of that current was flowing to the tweeter, and in fact, Figure 7, pretty much proves that no, that current was not flowing to the tweeter.
7) The 5 tones from 100-200Hz are flat on the CD, but are about 5-7 db different on the graphs, which makes sense on the single wire, or woofer graph where the impedance of the woofer in these frequencies could have a large impact, BUT, they should completely disappear in the Tweeter only graph, as in theory, that is only current in the Woofer wire. If the amplifier has a good damping factory, the voltage response will not change much, and the tweeter in a bi wire configuration should not see any difference in the amplitude of the tones.
8) Look at red graph in Figure. 6. HOW did a large NEW tone suddenly appear at 50Hz that is not in any other graph? That is simply not possible unless something changed.
9) Given the tweeter current draw from 300-900Hz is 90-100db down, the assignment of IM distortion products to single wiring in Figure. 7, where the distortion products are 60-70db down is an erroneous and impossible conclusion. More likely is test variation from temperature, voice coil heating, or ... the way they did the wiring which is not an actual comparison of single wiring to bi-wiring (it sounds good though doesn’t it) , but ... given 1-8, I am not surprising by 9,
"The single wired measurements were taken with two runs of speaker cable wired in parallel (speaker shorting pieces in place) and the bi-wired measurements were taken using the same arrangement with the shorting pieces removed. In this way both measurements used the same cross-sectional area of cable to eliminate any effect of lower resistance on our measurements."
heaudio123 you have an interesting argument , I'm going to read the link and your response at least one more time . I'm going to assume that they " qaucustics " used thier own speaker and cables .
Considering that the feedback changes the effect of this resistor and makes it approach 0 ....
... and the load changes the feedback.
Historically this was never provided for bi-wiring, it was provided for Bi-Amping to reduce IM distortion and/or tailor amps to frequency range.
Systems designed to be bi-amped typically do not have internal crossovers. Systems with properly designed passive crossovers make poor candidates for bi-amping. Amplifier response varies with the load and driver response varies in combination with the driving amplifier and the parallel loads of the additional drivers.
This is quite easy to demonstrate: 2 identical power amps y'd from the source. Drive the LS full range, bi-wired and bi-amped. There are 3 distinct responses, all easily identifiable.
Some drivers make poor bi-amping candidates without either active or passive equalization other than crossover slopes.
There is no, and never has been, any free lunch.
@heaudio123 I don't understand why you are so antagonistic. My examples are stated necessarily simplistic to communicate concepts. Are you a manufacturer? Audio sales? "atmasphere, as someone who designs amps (for many applications), I cannot agree at all with your comment w.r.t. amount of feedback and sounds profile." from
https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/it-looks-like-a-debate-to-me?page=2
@bigkidz i am in hotel California for now..... seattle when I can travel safely, since you have the lovely 5a I will send them to you shipping gratis- just listen and enjoy :-)
The whole reason speakers started to have 2 sets of terminals was not for bi-wiring, but for bi-amping. Current starvation in the output devices, increased IM in the output stage from non-linear effects at higher currents, and IM from modulation of the power supply from bass frequencies is eliminated from the amplifier that only supplies the typically much lower current mids/highs. Voltage induced distortion effects at other stages in the amplifier will still occur of course, but traditionally this has been less of an issue.
There is no technical justification for "systems with properly designed passive crossovers make poor candidates for bi-amping", since the benefits are not for the speaker, they are for improvements in amplification. For amplifiers with lower THD at high power (typically because of high distortion near the 0-crossing), the high frequency amplifier will increase in IM, but will reduce in THD by riding on the high voltage bass signal. That same amp with an input passive filter for the highs can have sonically unacceptable distortion characteristics on real music.
Systems designed to be bi-amped typically do not have internal
crossovers. Systems with properly designed passive crossovers make poor
candidates for bi-amping.
The parallel loading of the additional drivers on the amplifier is almost always negative (see above) if your goal is accuracy and un-colored sound. Bi-Wiring only adds a very small amount of isolation, basically the impedance of one set of wires, which with competent wires is very little. Bi-Amping completely electrically (and back EMF) decouples the two driver sets.
driver response varies in combination with the driving amplifier and the
parallel loads of the additional drivers.
I don't know the exact model, but for the progression, it is one of the rare times I would agree with Paul McGowan, as it is the same story I have heard from truly old-time audiophiles (my dad included) and matched the stories I read. First DIY, with SS base and tube for the mid/highs, and then speaker companies started to build the capability in. It never really took off, but it was a differentiator between cheap and "good".
With one set of binding posts on the speaker end, in theory, unless you are modifying the connections to/thru the crossover, the only benefit would be thicker wire. If the speaker has 2 sets of binding posts, and they give you a choice of paths through the crossover, then some changed response is possible. However, dedicating copper to frequency bands leads to less than optimal use of the copper. At some points in time the base may need a lot of energy from the amp and it cannot make use of the lower resistance that a common thicker wire would provide.
I think there are potential downsides of biwiring. The speaker designer (assuming they are competent) went to great pains to develop a crossover that effectively splits the signal between drivers, assuming the SAME SIGNAL on the inputs to the two parts of the crossover. Anything that might result in a different signal on the two input connections is going to defeat this design effort.
Now, I suppose, if you prefer the sound from two separate connections to the speaker, then that's really all that counts. But if you are asking a theoretical question, I'd stick with a single connection to the speaker unless it was specific engineered to use an active crossover with biamping.
@bigkidz Peter external shotgun biwire AQ Type 6 headed your way :-) I am guessing Tuesday you should have them to listen to :-))))) music is the gig - have fun
I think it depends on speakers ... I have had Quad Kef, Falcon LS3, PMC and now Tannoy.
The biggest difference is the Tannoy speakers where it was immediately clear almost like jumping up a model. On the rest it has been marginal and sometimes pretending to yourself it made a huge difference. So borrow some wire - try and then decide.
Out of interest my Harbeths had one terminal as it is something the designer thought worked and there was definitely a fashion for biwire speakers at one point that wasnt always sonically warranted except buyers demanded it and manufacturers supplied ....
I have Larsen 6.2s run with an Exogal power DAC, Comet and Ion. I hear absolutely no difference between bi-wire and single speaker cable, and in fact one reviewer of the speakers said his sounded better with the single wire. I did keep the bi-wires on, just in case....
I run an old pair of Acoustat 1100's which are bi-amped and bi-wired as the demands of the woofer modules and panels are quite different. It did make a difference.
vair68robert. So! You disconnected the speaker posts, modified the crossover, added more speaker posts, yet you are convinced that the difference you think you hear is the bi-wiring. Hmmm.
Despite the fact that I have always thought bi-wiring is hokum, I am offering info from Vandersteen; however, the company does point out that the only advantage is from getting the magnetic field generated in the the woofer wires away from the mid/tweet wires, due to resistance differences. i.e. it can only work if you separate the wires from each other:
"The crossovers in Vandersteen bi-wirable speakers are engineered with
completely separate high-pass and low-pass sections. The bass inputs
pass low-frequencies to the woofers, but become more and more resistive
at higher frequencies. The treble inputs pass high-frequencies to the
midrange and tweeter, but become more and more resistive at
low-frequencies. The output from the amplifier always takes the path of
least resistance so deep bass frequencies go to the bass input (Low
impedance at low-frequencies) rather than to the treble inputs (High
impedance at low frequencies). For the same reason, treble frequencies
go to the treble input (Low impedance at high-frequencies) rather than
to the bass inputs (High impedance at high-frequencies). At the actual
crossover frequency, the output from the amplifier would be divided
equally between the two inputs as they would both have the same
impedance at that frequency. Because of the different reflected
impedances of the cables, the crossover between the woofer and midrange
actually occurs at the wire ends where they connect to the amplifier." Caveat Emptor.
For those of you who state that you use both sets of speakers posts, because the speaker was designed for bi-wiring: NO IT WAS NOT! It was desigined for bi-amping. Bi-amping separates the current going to the woofers, and to the mid/tweeets. Bi-ampig does not. However, See my post from Vandersteen for resistive effects from woofer impedence. i would like opinions on this, because it makes sense to me, despite my Hokum Meter.
RE: Whip-Shaw's post quoting Vandersteen. If you bi-wire doesn't the wire carrying the signal to the bass driver carry the FULL range of the frequency to the bass driver but the treble frequencies are filtered out by the crossover before it gets to the driver?
And doesn't the wire coming from the amp to the tweeter carry the FULL range of frequencies to the crossover and then the low frequencies get filtered out before it gets to the tweeter?
I do not think bi-wiring or even bi-amping eliminates the crossover does it? It simply directs the signal to different sections of the crossover. One goes to the low pass filter, the other to the high pass filter. The full frequency of the signal is delivered through EACH of the two wires only to be filtered after it gets to the crossovers. So the bass frequencies STILL interfere with the treble frequencies in each wire, as they would if only one wire was used. CHANGE MY MIND.
I believe RVs argument is something along the lines of having separate wires for the highs and the lows helps prevent back EMF from the large magnet in the woofer from interfering as much with the high frequencies. This I learned from a biwire question at one of his seminars. I suggest asking him directly.
Here we go again with insecurity of. The audiophile This remind me of the series of Tarzan and the witch doctor does the electrician are certified?does he pass the board?come on this is the kind of person of the bunch that think his ability is unquestionable with no knowledge what is doing and the worse is trust your gear to them to perform barbaric repair enough lets get to the point first the dedicated ac circuits from the rest of the of your home is to cancel noise from the appliance from your house like frog air cond microwave is audible and that you could hear in your hi end gear take an oscilloscope and test your ac outlets and detect for noise in the line of voltage and see the wave is with noises in different Fq that one number two copper and silver and gold are the best conductor and have their advantage in the spectrum I use Siemens breaker and ac outlets and solid core copper and a separate Ground rod isolated for protection and keep safe your gear and also improve your sound quality of your system if you have an apéndice remove you go to the surgeon not to the witch doctor unless your electrician use trump desinfectant to clear your your ac anomalies go ahead I am a electrical eng with 50 years experience and also an audiophile when you hire somebody be sure is a certified profesional not a street barber
No I did not add speaker posts , have not modified the cross over boards . The question was does bi-wiring inprove the sound ? I should have asked if bi-cabling or 2 seperate runs of cable sound better ? especially if you used one cable for the positive and the other for the negative posts ( have any of you tried this set up ? )
My speakers have 2 crossover boards , one for the bass and the mid/tweeter is seperated on one board , sharing the speaker wire input , easy splitting for bi-wiring .
If it is easy, do it. What can it hurt to find out and know for yourself? If it were a PITA to do, then I would have the same concerns your OP had. But since it would be an easy experiment, do it and report back. You know that further contributions to this thread will continue in the same vein with those advocating one or the other side. (as usual). Have you EVER seen a subject when it comes to our hobby where there is a reliable and absolute consensus? At best these questions are an academic exercise. At worst they are contentious arguments.
I have come to realize that all the opinions, reviews, theories, experiments, discussions in the world do not trump my own experiences. I am the only person who knows what I like and want. And it is EXPENSIVE and time consuming to go through this journey. But your particular situation here is not all that expensive nor time consuming to try. In fact, it could have been done in the time it took this thread to peter out.
And my reading reviews has done more harm than good for me in the outlay of money department. I really have not improved the sound of my stereo since 1984, even though I have been through over a hundred components. I have circled back to a very similar system I had back in 1984 much to my satisfaction. If only I had just left it alone.
A technically good amplifier is like an ideal voltage source with a low output series resistance and able to supply whatever current a load (wire, crossover, drivers) require. The problem is that the long wire presents a series resistance and inductive load with some shunting capacitance which causes the signal at the loudspeaker end to be different from that at the amplifier end, depending on the current being drawn. Even this is a gross simplification. Engineers model elements of a system to be good enough. Enough for what? Enough for realization of basic function and requirements. This doesn't mean that a power amp with a DC supply that can deliver 5A at 50V is perfect even though that supply meets its' specifications. In your computer chip, to ensure that a logic gate triggers when expected. As those systems get smaller and faster, the models have become more and more sophisticated to satisfy basic functional needs. Separating the upper and lower sections of the loudspeaker crossover from each other (requires separate terminals) will allow parallel runs from the amp to the speaker. The most basic factor is that, all things being equal two sets of cables will halve the series contribution of the wire to the system signal disturbance. This can also be achieved with a shorter run of wire. The bi-wire improvement will mostly come about because the high current woofer load distortions will no longer generate a voltage disturbance signal at the tweeter since they will not be present at the high terminals or at the amp terminals (assuming the amp is not a tube type with high output impedence). I could beat this to death but a simple circuit analysis using non-ideal elements will show this. So much for the assertion that there is no science, or more accurately, technical basis. Many people learn basic I=E/R and think they understand everything. A loudspeaker is not a simple 8 ohm resistor, a cable is not equivalent to a small resistance, and I=E/R are not frequency independent. Years ago, I used to argue vehemently, as an arrogant, self-assured electrical engineer, that power cords couldn't make a difference because the amp converted (rectified and filtered) AC into DC. My model must have been too simple since after finally trying different power cords and conditioners my reaction was: "No freaking way!". I've since come to see that the amount of benefit of a power cord depends on the application. I've found the biggest improvements with high power class A amps which are always generating large current pulses, and for relatively noisy components like DACs etc. My preamp was not very sensitive to the power cord since it utilized a sophisticated DC bus followed by a 400 Hz AC system which was then reconverted to DC.
Simple answer on question on if bi-wiring improves or not sound is - yes, it will improve sound.
The longer cable is, the better improvement will be. Alternative to bi-wiring solution to improve sound could be mono-blocks closer to speakers, and shortening cables. If speaker cable is 2ft or less, bi-wiring will not improve anything much.
Main reason to have bi-wiring option is a fact as speaker is not linearly behaving load, and therefore sharing cable connection resistance and inductance will increase intermodulation between low/mid/high. For low freq. speaker resistance of cable should be lower than mid/high, because speakers (almost) never use crossovers with additional in series resistor for lows, and also utilize lowest ESR Inductors $$. Mid/High crossovers typically have couple of Ohms in series resistors, and therefore 100 mOhm cable resistance does not make any difference. The most important for Mid/High cable is to have lowest as possible inductance.
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