Conduit

Overall Rating
 5 of 5

Value Rating
 5 of 5

Used product for
More than 1 year

Visitors rate this review
5.00 of 5, 2.00 votes

Price Paid:  $60.00 from DIY

Summary:
Wow, is all I can say! I had no idea many years ago that this Cat 5 network cable speaker cable would take off the way it has. I am so pleased to return here after a lengthy hiatus to find that many of my IT/non-IT brethren have discovered this little DIY project and had such great success with it! Thanks all for your support! So the update is: I've been using these now successfully for over five years with great success on the original pair. To clear up some of the design questions I've gotten: - Yes, you must use each twisted pair in the cable as a + and -. - Be careful of using too few cables. For my needs, 4 Cat 5 cables combined the perfect mix of flexibility and aggregate wire gauge. This implies a total of 16 24 gauge wires for each polarity. This means that 4 Cat5 cables provide just under 12 gauge of aggregate area (which should be plenty for all but the most absurd run lengths and power levels). - Why does it work so well? To keep things simple, the smaller wire leaves more of the signal travelling on the surface of the wire, resulting in less distortion of more of the signal than a single fat cable of the same gauge. The signal on the surface of the wire moves faster than the signal propagating through the center (since copper is not a superconductor, SOME of the signal must travel through the inner portion of the wire...this is not HS physics class with ideal everything ;) ) Comparing 12 gauge monster cable to a set of these will clarify (heh!) it for you. - Some have asked if other cable can be used. Sure. The selection of the Hitachi cable in question was strictly on the basis of: Dielectric material (teflon inner and outer jackets) Twisted pair configuration (necessary for the Litz, or geometric shielding, provided) Cost (Quality Cat 5 can be had at a fraction of some of the exotic options...I've spent hundreds of hours pouring through the Belden catalog, and not found many appealing options for speaker cables). - What about OFC conductors, Golden ratioed conductors, etc.? If you feel those things matter, then you will have to find a manufacturer that combines the above qualities with these 'designer' ones. I don't know of any, and none of the super high speed CAT cables capable of multi-gigahertz signaling seem to either. Stick with quality in manufacture, and the solid principles behind these cables will do the rest. - Can you draw/diagram/photograph the quad braid? Not really. Everything is perfectly routed in my system, but if I get a chance when I move in a few months, I will peel back the jacket and photograph this braid. I emphasize that braiding the four main cables this way is simply the easiest, most effective way to cleanly run and manage them. It has no benefit aside from that (it does look very cool, though!). Again, anyone with questions, please feel free to email me at any time. TAKE THE CAT5 PLENUM-GRADE CHALLENGE! :D

Strengths:
Exceptional staging and depth Very low cost Embarassingly outperforms boutique audio cables costing an order of magnitude more

Weaknesses:
Largish overall bulk for gauge of cable

Price Paid:  $20.00 from RadioShack

Summary:
I made the Triple T as shown on this link (http://www.tnt-audio.com/clinica/triple_t_e.html) about three months ago. After hook them up to my old Celestion, I decided to keep those 10 year-old Celestion for another 10 years and get rid of my beloved Monster Cables. For a little cost but some work, Triple T can bring the best out of every speaker by faithfully transfer audio signals from one end to the other without adding or subtracking much(if not all). If I had known speaker cable really make a difference (I did not believe it till I made Triple T), I would have try this Cat 5 long ago. I always thought there was no other way, that I haven't tried, of getting more detail, more defined bass notes, deeper soundstage out of my Celestion. Now, I can enjoy my 1300 plus CDs and play around with my Celestion all over again. Really, you should give it a try. You will like it and find new life in your speaker.

Strengths:
Very very low noise. Crystal clear presentation. Detailed highs but not aggrasive. No more boomy bass, but go a bit lower and well defined pitch.

Weaknesses:
While a lot of people think the extra capacity would be a problem, for most of the amps now a day won't be a problem at all. Make it as short as possible if you really worry about it. Speaker cables should be as short as possible anyway no matter what you use. Hard on the fingers while making the pair. Get a wire striper is a must.

Similar Products Used:
I tried a lot of electronics with no better improvement than making this Triple T which I did not even believe in the first place.

Price Paid:  $20.00 from microcenter

Summary:
Well I decided to try to make the Cat 5 cables described on http://www.tnt-audio.com/clinica/triple_t_e.html It was a bit of work but well worth it. After completing one cable, I could not wait to give it a try so I replaced the left side speaker cabe with my homeade cable. Then I played a mono signal through both channels and used the balance control to compare. WOW! These people that do not think there could be much difference are crazy. Better bass and treble. Improvement in every area. Just amazing. I even did a blind test on my wife where I would not tell her which speaker had the homemade cable and ask her to pick which speaker sounded better. She got it right 5 out of 5 times. Also, and this is very important. You MUST take advantage of the "twisted pairs" That means at the termination you need to untwist the colored and white wires from each other and twist white with white and colored with colored!! The colored can be positive and the white negative. If you do not do this then you will lose the noice cancellation of having the positive and negative signals going in opposite directions twisting around each other!!! The key is in the twisting. Also, don't just use 1 cat 5 cable... the total guage of just one cat 5 cable is too small to get the most out of your bass. Another review suggested the wrong method. The above is right. Read the directions at: http://www.tnt-audio.com/clinica/triple_t_e.html Skeptics should try it, what do you have to lose besides a bit of time and very little money. You will be glad you did.... but do it right, I have a feeling that those that did not hear how much better this cable method is did it wrong.

Strengths:
Better than those rip off cables costing hundreds of dollars.

Weaknesses:
Hard on the fingers when being made.

Price Paid:  $0.00

Summary:
Are you kidding ? the "difference" you are hearing is the additional impedance the Cat 5 cables are introducing to the load. Does it "sound" better ? well, that is subject to individual perspective. Is it an accurate reproduction ? not likely. Yes, the highs do sound a bit crisper, (due to the thin strand of wire, provided you only use a single strand (1 for +, 1 for -)) but also colored, & subdued. meaning you will need to turn up the volume a bit to compensate for the loss of output. If you could find Oxygen free copper Cat5 cable & run it from the amp to the tweeter (& upper mid) & run the same wire in multi-stranded format for the mid & Base, you will probably hear some improvement & yes, it will sound accurate, provided you used enough strands to equal the guage recommended for the wattage you are driving. P.S. - don't forget to compensate for the higher impedence when you are calculating for the wattage !

Strengths:
Good for 10/100 base-T networks. bad for audio.

Weaknesses:
This is DATA cable. it is meant to send 0s & 1s at frequencies well above the human hearing range. you may get the same response from your speakers by using telephone wire - better yet, go to Radio Shack & get some 22 guage "speaker" wire for about $2.00 you will get the same performance.

Similar Products Used:
many, many, & yes, I've even conjured up a few of my own.

Price Paid:  $30.00

Summary:
I first have to state that IF you are deciding to go for this cable you should first read the tutorials on the internet and then think through if you want to put all this effort in it (it is not really easy to do if you want to wire a speaker which is 12 meters away from your receiver :)) Now I would advise you to put all this effort in these cables because the difference is superb! The dynamic range is higher, much higher even, the best difference was heard at my surround speakers which are 12 meters away from my receiver. First I connected one speaker with the new cable and the other one still with the old cable, there I heard that with the old cable there was way less dynamic range. I.E. with the new cable there was really more bass and higher highs. My config: Denon 1800 DD Receiver 4x Chario Hyper 1000 speakers 1x Chario Hyper Center Speaker So if you have two left hands I would recommend you to get someone to help you with it! ;)

Strengths:
Low cost (my old center speaker cable costed me € 55!) Best quality I have heard because of the dynamic noiseless sound.

Weaknesses:
Much work, for long cables it is not really fun to do

Similar Products Used:
Nordost center speaker cable and noname speaker cable from my local audio supplier