Speaker Wire Length Question

[spark001]

My receiver is located in the TV stand below the plasma. Therefore, the speaker wire run to the front speakers is much shorter than the run to the rear speakers, which are mounted on the wall near the ceiling. The rear speaker wire runs go below the floor into the basement ceiling, then across and up into the wall to the speakers (which are about 12 ft back from the receiver/tv. Running length would be much greater). I'm curious as to how picky you guys are to having ALL your speaker cable lengths the same. Is there a recommeded limit to the difference between the length of the front channels compared to the rear channels? Does it really make a diffence? Thanks!

[Woody]

It makes no difference at all. Wire away!

[allstar780]

if your receiver has distance setup then it will take the fact that the speakers have different wire lengths into account.... and unless you were running like a 100 foot run VS a 5 foot run, it probably wouldnt make an audible difference anyways

[gearyt]

It would only make a difference if you used "tiny" wire

[Lucy Diamond]

The differences are sooooooooooo tiny I'm almost positive you will hardly notice.

I mean...there is always the chance that you are running 7 monoblocks with handwound solid gold cable, but I don't think you are and I think you will be fine.

Give yourself some slack in case you want to move the fronts around later on too. I cut mine to length and it was a mistake.

Enjoy,

[chasarms]

The signal that passes through the speaker wire as AC electrical current. Thus, it moves basically at the speed of light.

As stated above, the issue is resistance. The longer the wire, the greater the resistance. In addition, the thiner the wire, the greater the resistance.

Resistance causes a voltage drop. Voltage charges the voicecoil, the coil moves. Thus does the cone, the moving cone creates sound. So, less voltage means less sound.

However, the within normal tolerances of conventional equipment and wire, it would not be audible.

The other nice side effect of resistance is heat. For demo of that phenomenon, turn on a light. Or, check what what happens when some teen wires up a 1,600W power amp to his kickers using a 20 ft run of 8 AWG wire (without bothering to fuse of course) You see those cars on the side of the road once in a while.

[spark001]

Thanks for the prompt replies!

[Pelican170]

I think they say that if you do runs over 25 ft, then you need to lower the guage.

[RUR]

Originally Posted by Pelican170

I think they say that if you do runs over 25 ft, then you need to lower the guage.

Proper speaker wire gauge vs. length vs. speaker impedence table here: http://www.roger-russell.com/wire/wire.htm#wiretable

[Snowgod]

If you set up your speakers with an SPL meter you will adjust for any differences.

[Snowgod]

Yes but! If you use an SPL meter to set up your speakers, the adjustment will compensate for the length of the speaker wire run by adjusting the channel output to make the speaker match the others. Yes the size of the wire will affect the output and more than 25ft of cable should be a large quality(low O2 copper) wire of 12-14 gage. Still, the adjustments using an SPL meter will correct the output to match the other channels.

[richteer]

Originally Posted by Snowgod

Yes but! If you use an SPL meter to set up your speakers, the adjustment will compensate for the length of the speaker wire run by adjusting the channel output to make the speaker match the others. Yes the size of the wire will affect the output and more than 25ft of cable should be a large quality(low O2 copper) wire of 12-14 gage. Still, the adjustments using an SPL meter will correct the output to match the other channels.

I think you're talking cross-purposes. Yes, an SPL meter can help you compensate for differences in level, but it can't help compensate for any temporal changes.

[fronn]

The Speaker distance option in the receiver is generally for correcting for phase issues that will occur if speakers aren't equal distance away from you, as the sound waves from the speakers will then hit you at different times and cause all sorts of wacky effects.

The auto setup programs will generally set those all automatically for you (and who knows what else -- scarily). Otherwise just get out a tape measure and round to the nearest foot.

If you want to hear the effect changing one speaker to like 15 feet and the other to like 2 feet and you should hear a strange effect - a phantom speaker, iirc. Or you can switch the wires on one speaker if you really want to hear phase issues