Locking Banana comparison

[Ropeburn]

How do you know which cable is which at each end without ending up with 30 labels on the same cable, since it's not color coded (at least not in that pic)?

Come on mate. Have you never held any sort of multicore cable in your hands? It's all marked in one way or the other.

 

[Sokel]

How do you know which cable is which at each end without ending up with 30 labels on the same cable, since it's not color coded (at least not in that pic)?

Cores are numbered:

 

[pablolie]

Cool, no it wasn't clear from the pictures in the link, and no otherwise - i have only worked on clearly color-coded cables (and sometimes you get a surprise even there :-D).

 

[Sokel]

Cool, no it wasn't clear from the pictures in the link, and no otherwise - i have only worked on clearly color-coded cables (and sometimes you get a surprise even there :-D).

It goes without saying that every DIY cable (and not only DIY, somewhere around here there's a Cordial I stripped to show horror story) has to be checked, in series, in parallel and in any way imaginable.
Not only speaker ones, I have measured signal ones that their resistance was down to kΩ measured in parallel

 

[xanalog]

I have measured any potential effect in any possible way, I haven't seen anything weird.

I was j/k about the "skin effect"; I should've added a squirrel on AC wires or a
Sorry.

The above was the 11AWG (40feet, w/750 strands, in yellow/red) speaker wiring I used for my last DIY.
Upon detailed A/B listening tests, we could not detect any difference between the yellow and the red silicon rubber insulation.

 

[somebodyelse]

Upon detailed A/B listening tests, we could not detect any difference between the yellow and the red silicon rubber insulation.

Sunglasses so you couldn't see which colour you were using?

 

[Ropeburn]

Sunglasses so you couldn't see which colour you were using?

New method unlocked: colourblind testing

 

[xanalog]

New method unlocked: colourblind testing

Wellll.... this is OT but... to get the WAF approval, I had to go a wee-bit further.

These expandable, braided sleeves are cheap @90cents/meter.
So, along with the yellow/red cabling, I ordered 10meters of the extreme-Left and the 2nd-Rightmost ones!

I made it an 'audience-participation sport' and LET my mate choose which one to use.
Knowing she'd choose the 2nd-Rightmost...

Would that make it a true "Double Colorblind" testing?

 

[poopy]

Cores are numbered:

View attachment 470747

I’d think noise and crosstalk are maximized with such cables - Star-quad configuration for each channel/way is best

 

[Ropeburn]

I’d think noise and crosstalk are maximized with such cables - Star-quad configuration for each channel/way is best

I get how you think of crosstalk, but noise?? Where from?

 

[Sokel]

I’d think noise and crosstalk are maximized with such cables - Star-quad configuration for each channel/way is best

Crosstalk by what?
They all carry the same channel.

 

[poopy]

I get how you think of crosstalk, but noise?? Where from?

EMI/RFI - Don’t you use power cords?

 

[poopy]

Crosstalk by what?
They all carry the same channel.

What application do you have in mind? Usually those are used for multi-channel or multi-ways if external crossovers. Not the same signal in both cases.

 

[Sokel]

What application do you have in mind? Usually those are used for multi-channel or multi-ways if external crossovers. Not the same signal in both cases.

Usually those are used for to control industrial applications.
Multi-way, yes. So, same channel, different BW, that's all. There's no such thing as crosstalk like that.
I use them for two channel active speakers (external crossover) . One 21-core run to each channel and then divided anyhow I like.

Multichannel, how? One would have to strip them to the point it has no meaning any more.

 

[xanalog]

EMI/RFI - Don’t you use power cords?

Just so that no one can say that about my [colorful] speaker cables, I inserted a ferrite core, hidden inside the above referenced braided sleeving.

 

[poopy]

There's no such thing as crosstalk like that

Nope

 

[Ropeburn]

EMI/RFI - Don’t you use power cords?

Interference in speaker cable? People have used simple insulated wire since forever, this is no different.

 

[Sokel]

Nope

I admit I have never tried to measure crosstalk this way.
I'm trying to figure out how now that I have my measuring rig running.

 

[bigguyca]

Not at all. I got my locking banana plugs because I could not get the same measured performance with Benchmark AHB2 that I could get with SpeakOn with any other connection. Yes, they will sound fine but they won't measure fine. At these extremely low distortion levels, connection quality becomes very important.

With other amps it doesn't make as big of a difference but what he says is true in the context of their own amplifiers.

From a long ago an issue with banana plugs affecting JA's measurements in Stereophile.

Halcro dm38 power amplifier Follow-Up, January 2007 | Stereophile.com

John Atkinson returned to the dm38 in January 2007 (Vol.30 No.1): When I reviewed the 180Wpc, $18,790 Halcro dm38 stereo power amplifier in October 2004, I had found a rather higher level of distortion just before the amplifier reached its clipping point than was specified by the manufacturer.

www.stereophile.com

 

[somebodyelse]

The part explaining the cause of the problem:

It turned out that the connection of one of the dual bananas to one of the 6' cables was not as conductive as it should have been, due to oxidation of the cable conductors under the banana plug's grub screw. Mystery solved—though I don't have a clue why the nonlinearity manifested itself only at high currents.

This is why you want your connections to be gas-tight. Neutrik show this for the screw connections on their SpeakOn connectors, and I've seen the same from crimp manufacturers demonstrating why you need to use the right crimp tool.