Home audio people ! How long can speaker wire be before there is audio quality loss ?

Question

I just got a new surround sound (my first)....and I want to hide all my wiring as best I can.

I may need more than the factory given wiring to do so......so I was thinking of going out and buying some speaker wire and just attaching it onto the factory wiring to extend the wire.

Will there be a significant audio quality loss ? It wont be THAT much extra wire being added on.

Thanks !

Answer 1

here is a good read on speaker wire size v length.

i would advise not to add on to wires.

http://www.audioholics.com/education/cab...

Answer 2

There's lots of factors that can attribute to audio loss or distortion, length of wire being one of them. However; unless you have a media room the size of a grand cathedral, I wouldn't worry about wire length. Besides external influences, as far as I know, the only limiting factor that can have an effect is voltage drop. I believe that one calculation is based on length of conductor measured in feet, conductor size measured by the AWG, (American Wire Gauge) and input current. This is a good place to start when trouble shooting audio distortion since you can immediately rule out voltage drop as the problem with a simple calculation. If you're only adding a few feet, (even up to 75ft or so) I haven't experienced any audio loss in 10+ years. Hope this helps.

Answer 3

There won't be a very noticeable difference if there is even a difference at all.

Answer 4

maybe at about 40 ft there would be measurable quality loss. but thats only with a machine. you wont notice any quality loss unless you have an unblieveable system.

Answer 5

it  wont make  an  apreciable  difference  as  long  as  you maintain precicely the  same amount  of wire  for  each channel of  each   left  and right  pair.

the  signal  will travel  along  the  wire  at a fixed  speed  and  if  the lengths  are  too lopsided then  you  will  have  the  signal  arriving  to  one  speaker  ahead  of  the  other  causing  a  phase  distotion

  if  severe  enough that could cuse  the  left woofer  to  be  moving  in  while  the  right  is  moving  out  thus  cancelling  much  of  the  sound and  give  you  a  hollow weak  sound.

just  make  sure  the  wire  you  add is  at  least  as  heavy as  th  wire  thats  attached