Speaker cable, patch cords

[Buddy Shagmore]

Curious if this will be a 2 channel or home theatre system? Also what is your budget for the preamp and cd player?

[Kevin cornette]

Buddy, I’m going basic stereo. Like I had in the 70’s. I had a Crown Dc 300 with dc 150a matching preamp pushing Lascala’s. I used amp and speakers in the band I was in. So they have road wear on them. My son blew my Klipsch in 95. I’ve done several intergrated receivers with surround5.0 then a 7. When Bose came out with cube/ sub woofer I bought that, but every speaker I’ve owned since Lascala’s fails to do it for me. I’m starting over with this new addition of enclosing our garage. I’ve bought my amp and a pair of bookshelf speakers. And I’ll add on to that. Once if get the room built I’m planning on repairing and using my Lascalas again as I’ll finally have room to repair and use them after a long time in climate controlled storage. Right now I’ve got B&W 600 speakers and 150 wpc Mc152 amp. Now I need a preamp,cd/sacd player and maybe a turntable upgrade. And I’ve added $5000 into construction cost to buy preamp and disc player. I’m liking at Tubes4hifi preamp and also used McIntosh preamps. I’ve get several months to choose so any suggestions would be appreciated. Sorry I’ve taken so much space to answer your question. 

[the real Duke Spinner]

On 5/30/2023 at 4:01 PM, Marvel said:

NFPA 54 is for gas... electrical is NFPA 70.

 

Low voltage must meet CL2., which I'm guessing most will.

Guess that shows my age. 😀

[Shakeydeal]

If one isn't going to sweat the details with the rest of the system, zip cord is just fine. 

 

However, if you have done your homework and have put together a system of high quality components and have sorted out your room, cables can and do make the icing on the cake. You can usually take the responses of those who say otherwise and make an assumption that they have not done these things and you'd be right a good percentage of the time.

 

 

 

[Marvel]

Kevin,

Is your garage that you are converting a 2 car? Ours was converted  to a family room by the original owner of our house, maybe 30 years ago. Since it was a 2 car garage with a couple steps up into the house, it has 9 1/2 ft ceilings. Your LS  will sound great in a room that size. I've given my older son my LS and sold the huge MWS, but they were awesome in our room.

 

 

[Dave1291]

18 hours ago, Kevin cornette said:

Buddy, I’m going basic stereo. Like I had in the 70’s.

I feel your pain.  I'm 74 and finally put together my 60's dream system.  Gas and an old pair of LS.  Looked at my old green speaker wire and laffed.  What to do next?  Lamp cord, snake oil cables or what.  I decided to take a shot w/Blue Jean Cables so I ordered a pair off Amazon.  Really didn't matter if they worked or not but they HAD to sound better right?  Ordered a pair but before I put them in line I threw down a Gilmour lp for an AB test.  I heard an amazing difference but that's to be expected since I'm an old deaf guy.  Do they work?  For me, yes.  Then I picked up all the patch cords I needed cause my old ones HAD to be junk too.  Maybe it was the house wiring or whatever but that was the most I was going to spend on snake oil.  Just my .02 worth.  It's your nickel.  Since you're a vinyl dude slip on into Vinyl Record Spinning.  We're the red-headed step-children of the forum.  😂

[Kevin cornette]

Dave,our contractor says I’ve got about a month before our garage is converted or maybe longer, like I said earlier I’m doing my homework. It’s a pity that Baton Rouge no longer has a high end shop, at least looking on line it’s just Best Buy’s and Walmarts and a lot of car audio shops. I’m sure back in the days of listening rooms they would have had cables for you to sample. The only guy I worked around that was into hifi had a beautiful set up. The first time I ever saw an air compressor connected to a tone arm. I picked him up on our way to see Dixie Dreggs at House of Blues and he wanted me to come in and hear his setup. He had all equipment in a bedroom behind living room so in living room all he had was a couch facing two speakers. He wanted me to see if I could tell the difference between a cd and an album which I couldn’t. He said that all his cd’s he coated with this liquid I think it was called Goop? He swore it made an audible difference. But I couldn’t hear the difference. But it worked for him. I apologize for lengthy reply. You have peaked my interest in these new fangled cables though. 

[the real Duke Spinner]

7 hours ago, Marvel said:

Kevin,

Is your garage that you are converting a 2 car? Ours was converted  to a family room by the original owner of our house, maybe 30 years ago. Since it was a 2 car garage with a couple steps up into the house, it has 9 1/2 ft ceilings. Your LS  will sound great in a room that size. I've given my older son my LS and sold the huge MWS, but they were awesome in our room.

 

 

No WAF there 😀😀😀

[the real Duke Spinner]

3 hours ago, Dave1291 said:

I feel your pain.  I'm 74 and finally put together my 60's dream system.  Gas and an old pair of LS.  Looked at my old green speaker wire and laffed.  What to do next?  Lamp cord, snake oil cables or what.  I decided to take a shot w/Blue Jean Cables so I ordered a pair off Amazon.  Really didn't matter if they worked or not but they HAD to sound better right?  Ordered a pair but before I put them in line I threw down a Gilmour lp for an AB test.  I heard an amazing difference but that's to be expected since I'm an old deaf guy.  Do they work?  For me, yes.  Then I picked up all the patch cords I needed cause my old ones HAD to be junk too.  Maybe it was the house wiring or whatever but that was the most I was going to spend on snake oil.  Just my .02 worth.  It's your nickel.  Since you're a vinyl dude slip on into Vinyl Record Spinning.  We're the red-headed step-children of the forum.  😂

My patch cords/ interconnects are junk from the early 1970s. 🙄😀

[Dave1291]

@the real Duke Spinner  You have any thoughts Duke?  You're in it waaaay deeper than I am.  I'm cheap.  

 

hahaha thanks for that.  I was a typin away   ^^^^^^^

 

 

[Marvel]

 

 

 

I know I still have rca patch cables I got in the '70s...

 

[Kevin cornette]

Yes Marvel it is a two car garage. It’ll be 18’x 22’ when complete. Two windows on one wall and one door on another. A lot of bare wall space for shelving and hanging a few instruments. I love that pic you’ve posted. That’s one intimidating wall of sound. Literally! One could make enemies of one’s neighbors if you were not careful. 
my Lascalas got me in trouble more than once living in a duplex with the nicest little old lady next door. Shed  rap on the wall with her broom when it was too much. But she loved Dr. Buzzard/ Savannah band, Little River band, Manhattan Tranfer. That was the lost fall- winter of 1978. I’m being a little too open about myself. 
   I too hoard cords only now there’s hdmi, midi……several boxes worth. I know where are if I need them. 
   Dave I wanted to ask you about your 60’s dream system. Did you shop any retro or vintage stereo shops or go online like EBay?

I’ve bought from Audio Classics and I’m looking at refurbed McIntosh preamps at Reverb.com. 

[the real Duke Spinner]

,70s dream system for me

AR or Empire turntable ( had both)

JBL L36 or larger. Altec Valevlcias

Crown DC Amp

Stanton 681 eee cartridge

Sounded fantastically great. 🙂

[Dave1291]

2 hours ago, Kevin cornette said:

Dave I wanted to ask you about your 60’s dream system. Did you shop any retro or vintage stereo shops or go online like EBay?

I was just like everyone else I guess.  Had two Marantz receivers but can't remember which ones, a dual 1229 table w/a Shure V-15 and an Empire 2000 (maybe 4000 dunno) quad cart and a pair of ESS-AMT1 speakers.  I think I added maybe a Marantz cassete deck or some such animal. 

 

Then I went w/a complete top of the line SAE rack system & the 2600 amp, Linn table, which I still run and a pair of Infinity Reference Standard 2.5's.  Plenty for me.  Still have the big pre amp and the 2600 (NFS).  Also have the Infinity's sitting upstairs waiting on a lil TLC.  Gonna have to hit my stash of EMIM's & EMITS some day.  lol   I'll get on it just for giggles.  Maybe.  lol

 

Today, LS, JBL  SP128S sub, PrimaLuna integrated, Schiit Mani phono pre, my Linn w/a Dynavector 20X cart and about 100' of pristine vinyl.  I'm outta room and makin piles of new stuff so that's the #1 priority.  Gotta get it up somehow somewhere.  lolol  Tons better systems in here than this rig but I'm on the way out and sittin hard on my gold card.  lol  It works for me.    I love pissin off the neighbors!  

 

Ebay and other places?  Ummm no, I don't want someone else's headaches.  

[Dave1291]

@Kevin cornette if you want to notify someone here's the way to do it.  Type @thentheirnickname and look down below at the pop up list.  Click the nick and voila we'll get notified.  Use that so we see your notify and can respond. otherwise, we won't  know to respond.  Carry on!  lol

[the real Duke Spinner]

13 minutes ago, Dave1291 said:

I was just like everyone else I guess.  Had two Marantz receivers but can't remember which ones, a dual 1229 table w/a Shure V-15 and an Empire 2000 (maybe 4000 dunno) quad cart and a pair of ESS-AMT1 speakers.  I think I added maybe a Marantz cassete deck or some such animal. 

 

Then I went w/a complete top of the line SAE rack system & the 2600 amp, Linn table, which I still run and a pair of Infinity Reference Standard 2.5's.  Plenty for me.  Still have the big pre amp and the 2600 (NFS).  Also have the Infinity's sitting upstairs waiting on a lil TLC.  Gonna have to hit my stash of EMIM's & EMITS some day.  lol   I'll get on it just for giggles.  Maybe.  lol

 

Today, LS, JBL  SP128S sub, PrimaLuna integrated, Schiit Mani phono pre, my Linn w/a Dynavector 20X cart and about 100' of pristine vinyl.  I'm outta room and makin piles of new stuff so that's the #1 priority.  Gotta get it up somehow somewhere.  lolol  Tons better systems in here than this rig but I'm on the way out and sittin hard on my gold card.  lol  It works for me.    I love pissin off the neighbors!  

 

Ebay and other places?  Ummm no, I don't want someone else's headaches.  

It really does not take a lot to have decent Sound once you get past the BreastBuy generic black box crap. 🙂

[Buddy Shagmore]

Kevin, I have a great CD player, the Yamaha CD-S2100. It has an internal DAC, plus XLR connects, comes in silver or black. It is upper level-ish Japanese high fidelity. I love mine...in silver of course.

My friend has a Schiit Freya+ tube preamp, it punches way above it's price point. It also has XLR connects and comes in silver or black. USA made.

I also have 2 Schiit Modius tone control units, also have XLRs. it is the icing on my hi-fi and head-fi systems. 

Just a friendly recommendation.

[Dave1291]

Schiit does have some good Schiit @Buddy Shagmore

[pnort]

I use 12 gauge cord multi-strand bought on-line with my 16 ohm Khorns. The wire impedance should be plenty low enough compared to the speaker resistance. Not very expensive.

[Kevin cornette]

i just stumbled upon this section of unread post. Definitely still a newbie. i know somewhere in these post i mentioned having our carport enclosed to house all my stuff and all the great gear my friend left me earlier this year when he passed away from cancer. Man cave \ home studio, both....anyway contractors started last week. After so long a wait, windows and door are in, sidings on. interior wiring and sheetrock left to install. My preamp came in after a long and thorough search and for my ears and price its a perfect pairing to my little 150 wpc amp. When my room is complete ill move my lascala's in and replace woofers in them and hopefully after being in storage so long that'll be only repairs necessary for them plus a good sanding and cleaning. They look a tad rough because i used them for PA in most bands i was in through the 80's. They sounded great with my Crown dc 300 back in the day. I had good hearing back then. Buddy, thanx for info on cd player, thats gonna be my next purchase. I will be looking into the Yamaha. I've been out of hifi for a long time so no surprise I'm ignorant of most of this stuff so excuse me for asking seemingly stupid questions but I've seen dirt cheap dvd and cd players ,is the sound quality bad on these cheap units? I need both cd and a dvd player and brand names mean little to me if it sounds good with my system. Ive seen Sony,Panasonic for under $75 ! Does anyone have experience with these low price units? Since i need both cd and dvd player it makes sense to get a unit that does both. Is there any reason why i should buy separate units? Like i said ,I've been out the loop a while so i'd appreciate any advice on the subject. thanx again for advice.