Home Theater Hacks

Hack #44. Banana Plugs Trump Bare Wires

If you want the absolute best connection between your receiver/amplifier and your speakers, use one piece of cable and connect the bare wires at the ends to the terminals. However, there are times when a whole lot of convenience trumps a tiny bit of signal.

Any audiophile will tell you that the best way to get a clean signal from one place to another is with an unbroken signal path. The fewer breaks in a connection, the less likely it is that the wiring will oxidize, and the less opportunity for signal to be lost in transfer. In the home theater realm, this means that running a single wire from your amplifier or receiver into your speakers will result in the best signal transmission. I've seen too many homes with multiple strands of speaker wire spliced together, either because the wiring through walls [Hack #46] was done poorly, or because the person making the connections was just careless.

Further, you'll get the best connection between your binding posts on your speakers with bare wire; there is no signal jumping from wire to wire, wire to banana plug, or anything else. You've created the cleanest, simplest signal path possible. That said, you'll almost never find a high-end home theater that doesn't use banana plugs! That might seem strange, but it turns out to be a simple case of trade-off.

The binding posts on receivers, and most amplifiers, are usually in a small, tight area. It is a real challenge to get 12-gauge wire [Hack #46] ...