My electrician was in yesterday and I wanted to rewire my office with speaker wire in the walls to clean things up. I was wondering if anybody could give me their opinion on the following scenario -

Situation:

My opinion:

I wanted to have one central area where the 990/7700 is located so that all of the speaker wires could be attached to banana plug jacks on the wall. Firstly, I would use a three foot length of speaker wire to connect via banana plugs from the 7700 to the wall jack. Secondly, I would use a wall jack to wall jack. Finally, I would connect another three foot length of speaker wire to each of the 7 speakers. In this way, it would be clean and the wires would not be visible other than the 3 foot lengths at either end.

My electrician's opinion:

Rather than have 6 connections (two, 3 foot speaker cables with banana plugs on both ends) and (the wire in the wall with both ends) connected, he said that a plate on the wall with a small hole in it allowing the wire from the end to be directly connected to the 7700 and the other end directly connected to the speaker would reduce the number of connections from six to two and thereby reducing the resistance at the same time.

What do you think?

My side and rear surrounds are wired as you had originally intended - binding post wall plates at the amp and at the speakers. You can see one of them here . It makes for a cleaner looking install, and I've not noticed any negative impact on acoustics. Will you be doing this for all seven speakers or just the surrounds?

I'm wired at the wall near the amp as you describe then directly to the speakers (ie no second wall plate). I have not noticed any adverse impact on the sound and I don't think you'd have a problem by adding a plate at each speaker as Gonk has done. Regardless, IMO it is important to use a quality plug and that it fits snugly into the female connection (amp, wall plates, and speakers). I'm using screw type (not solder) banana plugs from Impact Acoustics that accept up to 10 gauge wire and been very happy.

The connections are definitely important - I'm actually doing bare wire into the binding posts at the speaker and the wall plate next to the speaker, with good quality banana plugs at the amp and the wall plage next to the amp.

gonk and AvFan,

Thanks, I am considering this for at least 5 of the seven speakers.

I, being an Electrician, would go and use the wall plates as you wanted originaly. This is the way I have my speakers installed and I feel this is cleanest way to install the wire. I haven't noticed any degradation in sound. Jim

I didn't really analyzed the electrical properties, this is just what I preferred. I used these wall plates for my front speakers. I had a similar logic than your electrician, plus I was being cheap (less $ on plugs). With the rubber grommet, the install looks like the cable is coming "from" the plate (not thru the wall), if you know what I mean.
I don't have a good picture showing the installed wall plate. This is the closest one. If you look closely, you can see the 2.5 inch wall plate behind the screen (bottom right corner) and the nearly invisible .5 inch wall plate behind the left speaker.

I put wall plates at the amp and speaker locations for one reason: WAF. She insisted, and I cried afoul of all of the possible EFI this would introduce. I thought I was going to be Mr. Smarty and give her the ol' A/B comparison to show her how she ruined my audio world.

To my surprise, there was no audible change.

Now I'm glad I did it, because people buying houses typically don't like to see wires hanging out of walls.

For those interested in even tighter connections, try using expanding banana plugs. A tightening collar or screw expands the plug into the jack, thereby ensuring a tight, wiggle free connection. They even come in a 45 degree version for tight spaces.
These can be purchased from various suppliers...or even on ebay.