Speaker wire

Help required.

Just got my first stereo separates. At the moment using speaker wire that is probably one step above bell wire. I keep hearing that good speaker wire matters but the sound at the moment is pretty decent.

Should I up-grade? Will I notice a difference? If so what type of wire do I need? And of course what should I pay? Only need a couple of meters, so what ever I pay shouldn't be that much, but I'd rather not spend money if I'm not going to get any real benefit from it.

Cheers.

Depends on your system how much you'll get from it, but it will make a difference. Easiest upgrade to make, followed by some good interconnects. Not too up to speed with the newest kit but BITD richer sounds stuff was ok for the price.

best place to go for seperates is still richer sounds, pretty sure they have an outlet in every city (could be wrong)
they can advise you on what would be good for your price range.

i myself went for some high midrange priced wire, cost i think 1.99 per metre quite thick 315 strand if i remember correctly.

but as has been said things change, and as ive said best thing to do would be to take a trip to richer sounds in your area.

Make sure you have equal lengths for each speaker

Do you have enough cable to run 2 lengths to each speaker?

Cooker wire gives decent sound at a very cheap price, I bought K2 "directional copper" cable BITD (about 4 per meter in 1990) and it was only slightly better.

It depends what the weakest link in your system is aswell. If your amp isn't up to the job, it'll make little difference what speaker wire you use.

I use 1.5mm 99.99% copper leads (pricewise pretty cheap) and am finding them to sound as good as when I was biwiring 3mm cables on the same system.

At long as sensible cross section, will be fine. 2.5mm sq is more than adequate. Solder some cheap gold plated plugs on and its swell. Gold plated plugs do make a difference as over time will not corrode like tin.

Biggest marketing bollox yet cables. Don't start me on directional cables FFS!

There are differences between cables, which may have an effect on a very expensive system, but key thing is there is a difference, not that something is loads better just cos its got PTFE insulation in blue 5mm thick etc.

Best spend your money where it matters most on the main parts and spend as little as poss on cables. You pays a lot for colours and names!
Ignore the you should spend 10% on cables rule that gets spouted. No chance is that best way to sound for pound.

I absolutely agree. I'm an Electrical Engineer and this cable thing drives me wild. It's all Emperor's New Clothes marketing.

Nice fat wires (like cooker cable or 2.5mm twin+earth) is fine - but cheapish stuff like Richer Sounds cable is probably slightly better as it's more flexible and easier to tidy away. If your paying more than a couple of quid a metre you are probably spending too much.

Thanks all for your comments. Looks like richer sounds is the place to go for both cost and practicality. Cheers.