Hi Everyone,

I am wondering what all the fuss is about speaker wires! I have a friend who works at a HT store who is trying to convince me that I need to spend nearly $1000 to upgrade my L/C/R speaker wires. Thank God my surrounds have in wall wiring or I might need to re-finance the home to cover the cost of those wires. He is recommending the Audioquest CV8 with the 72v DBS. So this lead me to several questions.

How noticeable is the difference between $1000 worth of cable and a couple of hundred dollars?

What does the DBS really add? My understanding it is for noise rejection, but speaker wires carry high current low impedance signals which would require a rather large signal to provide any kind of distortion. Clearly any normal amounts of EMI or RFI would not be strong enough to introduce any distortion.

I did some A/B testing of different cables at his store. The biggest differences I heard were that the more expensive wires were louder then the cheaper wires given the exact same conditions, i.e. volume level on the amp. I assumed less resistance therefore more signal to the speaker so more volume. However, once the listening level were adjusted I really couldn't tell the difference. Then he hit me with the real kicker. He told me that the good cables were brand new and they were not broken in yet. Supposedly they would start to "open up" once they have a 100 hours or so on them. What kind of crap is that? I understand speakers take some time to loosen up and sound their best, but speaker wire can that really be true?

Then of course comes the issue of bi-wiring. Personally I have made up my mind on this one. I am a Sonus Faber fan and have been for many years. Franco Serblin (SF's chief engineer) decided to stop making their speakers with bi-wire connections several years ago. In fact he recommends that owners of the older SF speaker that did support bi-wiring not use bi-wires so that pretty much settles it for me as I am quite sure he knows a hell of a lot more about it then I do!

In general how much do you spend on speaker cables relative to your entire system? Again, the sales guy is advocating that you should spend at least 10% of the cost of your entire system on the speaker cables. Well I have just over $10K in my HT system so by his formula the $1K for wires is correct. It is not that I am opposed to spending money on my system it is just that I wonder if the money might be better spent in other areas?

And finally, what brand/type of speaker cables to you use? Any opinion on Audioquest wires? Are there any brands you recommend?

Thank You in advance to all those who would respond.

Regrds,
Mark D. Rodriguez