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Do Speakon cables really make a difference?

#3
You mihgt hear a difference between a total piece of crap 1/4" cable and a quality speakon in terms of tone. I think the biggest difference will be making your amp happy by providing a high quality low resistance cable in between in and the cab.
 
#4
Slightly less noise. Tone improvements are negligible. Much sturdier and almost impossible to pull out accidentally. Depending on who you get them from, they're usually not much more than regular 1/4" cables.
 
#5
Ok - so it's not worth treating this as an urgent matter or anything. This is good to know - I always use at least fairly high quality speaker cables, so I should be fine without the Speakons, but I'll try one some time, knowing that it certainly won't *hurt*.

Thanks a lot for the input -Skel
 
#6
i dont know much about the science of how speakers and such work, and all that. But i use a speakon to 1/4th because my PLX requires it, and because it has a lock on it, so if cant be pulled out by mistake at a show. Its kinda like how you pull your cord through your guitar strap so you cant unplug it while playing. It just looks better than 1/4th too.
 
#8
What Bill said. The connector isn't designed to handle the current, ESPECIALLy as the jack ages and the plug doesn't fit quite as tight anymore.

Its a little silly to bother getting the high quality 2000 watt capable 10-12 ga speaker cable for high power applications and then using a cheap 200W connector.

Kind of like using 25 ft of heavy duty extention cords and going the last 5 ft with Walmart xmas tree light extention cord, or getting a top of the line Eden amp and using Kmart stereo speakers for a bass amp.

Why go to all the trouble of going almost the whole 9 yards the right way then settle for a cheap jury rig for the last few inches?

Randy
 
#9
what everyone else said--they handle high current with less resistance, they don't pull out, and they are much much sturdier than a 1/4 phone plug. They don't require solder. They have a better strain relief. They can be configured easily in different ways. They're much better than either 1/4 or bannan plugs

But I don't think there's much difference in sound
 
#10
I agree with what people have said so far, and would like to add, that if you play at very high voume, a 1/4inch plug can actually "blow out" of the socket. If it happens to touch the barrel of the socket befored the shank has cleared the opening, you would have a dead short. The live sound guys say that if you are running high powered (3000+ watts) amps, they can also produce lethal voltage. May be B**** but I don't care to experiment.

John
 
#12
One more thing to add: You can't physically touch the conductor in a Speakon connector in the manner that you can touch the working end of a phone plug. This means that a Speakon can't get all covered in fingerprints, sweat and body oils like it's quarter inch counterpart. Speakons make sense for a lot of reasons, but you have to decide if those reasons are enough to make you want to abandon a system that has worked well for the last half century. Good luck.
 
#18
popinfresh said:
Just a question.

What's a speaker XLR like compared to a 1/4". I have one on the V8, but the Schroeder has a Speakon, so not like i'll be using the XLR, just curious..
Click to expand...


XLR's on the back of an amp are for line level signals out to say a recorder or another amp and not for Speaker levels.

1/4" should have never been put on an amp for speaker purposes. Especially on a tube amp where a no load condition is harmful.
 
#19
LoveThatBass said:
XLR's on the back of an amp are for line level signals out to say a recorder or another amp and not for Speaker levels.

1/4" should have never been put on an amp for speaker purposes. Especially on a tube amp where a no load condition is harmful.
Click to expand...

Ah, but the XLR is for a speaker on the Trace's. Theres also a seperate one for DI :)

BTW. Is there anyway I could perhaps get that XLR changed out to a Speakon? Or would it just not work with the amp?
 
#20
What popinfresh is talking about IS a speaker connection. Europe (Trace Elliot=England) has had stricter connections standards for awhile, and even before their recent mandate of no exposed or shorting connections for high current (IOW, speakon or nothing), XLR was a popular format for speaker connections. It's not as good as speakon, and barely better than 1/4 and actually worse in some ways. Anyone with old Trace cabs can confirm that there are XLR speaker connections on them.
 

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