1/4 inch vs. speakon vs. banana plugs...

[NAtterberry]

Haha I'm not sure why you would want Speakon on your instrument, and I don't have the technical knowledge to give you a reason.

If the locking aspect is what you are after, Neutrik makes a 1/4" jack that you would be able to put on your instrument.

 

[ulrich]

Speakon>Banana>1/4"TS

Speakon excellent, banana good, 1/4 crap.

I waste no time modding cabs, from 1/4 to Speakon. Banana, I might, or might not bother to upgrade to Speakon, but no rush.

Banana is handy, because you don't need a special bridge cable, you just plug it in differently.

Yes, you can get phase wrong on banana, but there is a big minus sign molded in to them, so you can get it right, even in low light.

Never tin wires that are gonna be clamped, or screwed, such as on binding posts, on inside Speakon connectors.

 

[Biggbass]

Personally 1/4" has worked just fine for me for over 40 years without a single incident involving an amp to speaker cab cable. I carry a spare but have never needed it.
Occasionally a guitar cable used to go kaput but that was way back when they were crap to begin with. Speakon is fine if that's what you have but I wouldn't see any need to convert to it for my own uses.

whatever you decide, though, I highly suggest you contact Todd at ProCables and have him
build them for you. His work is near military grade and road worthy.

http://procablesnsound.com/PCNS_Main.asp

 

[walterw]

(the reason guitar signal cables are thin)

...it's because low-level, low-current signals don't NEED the lower resistance of a large conductor to have acceptable voltage drop. Why use more wire than you need to? Just makes the cable heavier, less flexible, and more expensive.

yeah, my understanding is that with signal cables, since the voltage and current are tiny, thinner wire is fine; the real issue here is capacitance, high frequencies bleeding from the hot to the shield.

so it's all about the shielding and the capacitance loss with signal cables, two things that don't factor into high-current speaker signals.

 

[Backstreets]

58 posts and no one has mentioned that banana plugs are VERY EASY to connect backwards... (reverse polarity) This is one more reason why all my high power cabs have Speakons. I DIY changed out all the 1/4" and banana plugs for Speakons 3 years ago. An easy and inexpensive upgrade that I highly recommend.

Many incorrect posts here but LOTS of good reasons for upgrading,

And there just isn't any good reason to use anything but anymore. JMO

58 posts and no one has mentioned that banana plugs are VERY EASY to connect backwards... (reverse polarity) This is one more reason why all my high power cabs have Speakons. I DIY changed out all the 1/4" and banana plugs for Speakons 3 years ago. An easy and inexpensive upgrade that I highly recommend.

Many incorrect posts here but LOTS of good reasons for upgrading,

And there just isn't any good reason to use anything but anymore. JMO

Thanks for the input. I agree, I would love to see Speakons on everything for safety's sake, and it appears they come on almost all bass amps and cabs of any worth today. However I probably should have clarified that both of my cabs have Speakons, but neither one of my heads do. One is an older high powered Trace head with only XLR and 1/4" speaker out options on each side. The other, which I just got over the weekend, is an early 90's SVT 2 Pro (PE) with only banana plugs and 1/4" speaker outs as options. If it was a cabinet I wanted to modify to accept Speakons, I wouldn't really have a problem with that. However, my cabs already have them, so I'm good to go in that regard, but I do not want to have the amplifiers modded to accept Speakons, as they are not very common amp models, for the most part, and I figure they were designed with those connections at the time, so I should be able to use those without problems. Maybe not though, from what you guys are saying?

Bigbass, thanks for the advice on Todd at Pro Cables. I've actually been in communication with him the past week or so in regards to having a couple custom speaker cables made for my relatively high powered Trace head(600 watts RMS per side), with an XLR connector on one end for the Trace, and then a Speakon connector on the other end for my cabinet. Since I just got this old Ampeg a few days ago, and I don't have any speaker cables yet, I was going to have Todd make me a cable or two for the Ampeg as well. This is the main reason I first asked my question, as I didn't know whether to have Todd make me a banana to Speakon OR a 1/4" to Speakon cable for my new (old) Ampeg, which is a 300 watt tube amp. Hope this clarifies my situation for everybody, thanks again for all the advice and assistance!

 

[bassmeknik]

Get a banana to Speakon cable. Bananas have decent surface area enabling much higher current flow than 1/4" jacks. IMO bananas have comparable capacity to Speakons. Having the Banana plug on the amp I would agree the easiest and best way to go is get a cable with banana plugs on one end and Speakon on the other. The power amp I use for vocal monitors (an old Carver) has bananas, it is in a rack so I don't have to fool with the bananas much but when I do it is usually dark and I have to use a flashlight to make sure it's polarity is always the same. That takes a minute or so if I can find my flashlight quickly. Everything else I own that's more than 300 watts has Speakons and I can always make the connection in a couple of seconds in the dark.

So for me Speakons are a time and hassle saver.

 

[Backstreets]

Get a banana to Speakon cable. Bananas have decent surface area enabling much higher current flow than 1/4" jacks. IMO bananas have comparable capacity to Speakons. Having the Banana plug on the amp I would agree the easiest and best way to go is get a cable with banana plugs on one end and Speakon on the other. The power amp I use for vocal monitors (an old Carver) has bananas, it is in a rack so I don't have to fool with the bananas much but when I do it is usually dark and I have to use a flashlight to make sure it's polarity is always the same. That takes a minute or so if I can find my flashlight quickly. Everything else I own that's more than 300 watts has Speakons and I can always make the connection in a couple of seconds in the dark.

So for me Speakons are a time and hassle saver.

Okay, thank you very much for the post, that info was definitely helpful in assisting me in my speaker cable decision! Cheers.