Easy Ways To Improve Generic Wires and High End Cables

• Lift all speaker, power, and interconnect wires 8" off any carpet or plastic tile. Use string, wood, cardboard, or 20 ounce Styrofoam cups for temporary props. You’ll think you’ve pulled horse blankets off your speakers. For a more civilized-looking solution, click here.

• For generic speaker wire, AC cords,  and wall wart umbilicals, always split their two-conductor wires and separate by at least 6" for a satisfying upgrade. Don't forget to keep all your system wire—IC, speaker and power--off artificial fiber rugs and de-static them regularly.

• NEVER use speaker cables shorter than 8'. Amazingly, 4' sounds much worse than 8'. Contrary to common belief, shorter interconnects (2 m or less) and longer speaker cables always sound WAY BETTER than the opposite—based on extensive head-to-head tests.

• Bi-wiring helps quite a bit, but only for cables with quite limited bass and treble. The better the cable, the less the benefit. By the time you get to the performance level of our Double Helix speaker cables, there is zero benefit in bi-wiring.

• To audibly improve any cheap interconnect, use a razor to carefully peel the thin plastic insulation off the braided metal you'll find underneath. Split 2-channel interconnects and separate the two by several inches. Cut heat shrink and plastic strain reliefs off the back of RCA plugs and remove their metal barrels (if possible). Among generic wires, choose the skinniest for best sound.

• To improve high end cables, remove any outer nylon mesh: the bad dielectric only adds grunge. Remove any metal barrels on RCA plugs—you lose the locking feature and gain transparency.

• Any cable with a molded-in ferrite (the small plastic-covered cylinder at one or both ends) sounds way better with the ferrite removed. Just carve away the plastic covering, then crack the exposed ceramic-like ferrite with a hammer. Don’t worry; you won’t harm the wire.

• Never bundle any of your system’s wires: bundling looks neat and sounds nasty