Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Stereo New cables: XLR Balanced and Speaker cable

I really don't like RCA unbalanced lines at all. I had issues with 60 cycle hum in my subs, the balanced lines eliminated that.

I know that balanced XRL terminated interconnects do pass a 6db higher signal with a lower noise floor over the RCA lines. I really notice it to be honest. The Y connector split balanced lines were very good, much better than RCA lines, but when I replaced those with single balanced lines, it really stepped it up quite a bit. From what I am told this will add in another 3 db over the Y connectors and this should improve the S/N ratio, which it seems to have done from what I heard.

I still cannot figure out what is going on with the 4 conductor Canare 4S11 speaker cable. As Mojo pointed out, dual 14 gauge leads welded together at the termination ends still effectively winds up at 11 gauge which will pass more voltage over a single 14 gauge wire or my previous 12 gauge wire. But the improvement I am hearing is more than the difference in just wattage; the vocals and high frequency ranges improved to my ears quite a bit. The twisted pairs in the dual conductors apparently will alter the inductance of the leads. Perhaps this is playing into this? Or is it the bourbon?