Speaker wire length...

  • Thread starter Thread starter FranklinD
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FranklinD

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Is it necessary for speaker wire coming from an amp to be the same length? This is probably a silly question but I'm just wondering if there would be any noticeable delay or anything like that if I hook up my speakers with mismatched lengths of wire.

Also, what's the best gauge to use for runs over 15ft. with a 100watt per channel amp? I'm trying to create music/video in surround sound and I'm using a 5.1 receiver to monitor, if that matters.
Thanks for any help.
 
the wire becomes more criticle at long lengths... and it aint all that criticle then... some would argue that since it contributes to the load it should be even ch-ch... and others would argue that having a big loop of wire laying around just to satisfy lenghts would increase some inductance and therefore freq response... others still.... in short it's bullshit for the most part... go to home depot/etc and buy the bulk stuff... mine is 10ga fwiw.... when you get to the point that it matters to you... you'll have an opinion...
 
Electricity travels so fast that in order for there to be a noticable delay once speaker wire would have to be a few miles longer than the other.

You would get a much bigger delay if one speaker was a couple feet farther away from you than the other.
 
Farview said:
Electricity travels so fast that in order for there to be a noticable delay once speaker wire would have to be a few miles longer than the other.

You would get a much bigger delay if one speaker was a couple feet farther away from you than the other.
Click to expand...

I actually figured this out once. If one cable is 10' and the other is 100', the delay worked out to be in the nanosecond range, IIRC. That's equal to one speaker being literally a hair closer to you than the other.
 
boingoman said:
I actually figured this out once. If one cable is 10' and the other is 100', the delay worked out to be in the nanosecond range, IIRC. That's equal to one speaker being literally a hair closer to you than the other.
Click to expand...

Put another way, at about 200,000 km/sec., for 180 degree phase cancellation at 22kHz you would need a cable length difference of 5 km. That's probably about the point where you'd start to notice the attenuation of high frequencies, since you'd get partial cancellation even at lower frequencies. You would not perceive it as a delay, though.
 
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