How many audiophiles bi wire their speakers????


I was wondering if Audiogon member use dedicate cables or amps for the upper and lower drivers?..if so were you pleased with the results?..does different jumpers cables have different sound signatures?...
bmwhaus
Mknowles16, How did you bi-amp with one amp? I may be reading your post wrong I guess and am not discounting what you have said as I can understand what works for one person may not work for another, but you did say..one amp?

Dave
I find the sound of bi-wiring is usually better than using a single wire of the same type. The only speaker in my experience for which this wasn't true was the Sonus Faber Concerto Home.

Much of the benefit may be eliminating that base metal jumper so many manufacturers use. With my Sonus Faber Electa Amator I's I had two runs of OCOS connected to the top binding posts and a high quality jumper between the top and bottom. It was easy to disconnect one of the wires anytime anyone asked the question, and the difference was obvious and convincing.
I have VR4 GenIII's & there is a 3' distance between the upper & lower module binding posts. I bi-wire these, as a 3' jumper doesn't seem practical to me from an economic standpoint vs. another set of cables. I did try using some inexpensive "jumpers" while auditioning different speaker cables & there was a difference in the quality of the sound, but to be perfectly honest, don't know what if any difference there would have been (compared to bi-wire) if I had used the same quality of jumper, as it was economically impractical to do that just for auditioning purposes.

Some 'philes who bi-wire use different brands or materials to further experiment; for example, copper for the bass & silver for the higher freqs. Additionally, a full size set of cables can be more readily sold if the user wants to try something else, etc.

As for bi-amping, using an electronic crossover is the best way to utilize multiple amps, as I have heard the same speakers with an electronic crossover then passive crossover & there WAS a very major difference between them. Most home stereo systems don't have electronic crossovers, so the bi-amp question, once you decide whether to use vertical or horizontal bi-amping, is if it makes enough of a difference (it will, regardless of configuration) for you to warrant the additional expense. Also, there is the question of using stereo vs. monoblock amps.

You'll have to experiment & judge for yourself and then decide if itÂ’s within your scope of diminishing returns

B&W specifically say that "Bi-wiring is the preferred method of connection ... The separation of the signal paths improves resolution of low-level detail and allows the user to optimise (sic) the type of cable to the frequency range of use." in the owner's manual, so I've Bi-wired my N803s. I figure B&W know what they're talking about and I've never bothered to see if any other connection options are any better.