A Guide To Subwoofer Cables
So you've just invested in a new subwoofer and its time to connect it to the rest of your system. Don't just use any old speaker wire you have lying around. You need to use subwoofer cables. Subwoofer cables are considered as a necessity for anyone that has a subwoofer so you can reproduce those bone-jarring bass notes with clarity and punch. So where do you buy these specialty subwoofer cables? Actually, there are many places where you can shop for these cables. But before you rush out and buy some cheap, junky speaker cables, you need to know what makes a good cable for a subwoofer and why you need special cables for it. A subwoofer cable is basically a line level analog audio interconnect cable like you would use to connect a cd player or dvd player to your receiver. Contrary to what some people believe, heavy gauge (meaning a thicker wire) is completely unnecessary for a subwoofer cable, unless of course, extremely long lengths are involved. Subwoofer Cable Materials
Take a good look at the subwoofer cable to see the quality of the components. The conductor material should be of good quality; gold, for example, is one of the best metals you can use for a conductor. The dielectric the insulator between the metals (PVC is common here but Teflon is also used in high-quality subwoofer cables). For cables with a greater length and longer run, you want to look for a cable with a lower capacitance as overall loss becomes more important. Where can I buy Subwoofer Cables? You can always run down to the local megastore and find cables. But you probably won't find the highest quality cables there. And you may be spending as much there for a lower quality cable then if you just shopped around and compared different quality cables at different audio specialty stores. If you do most of your shopping online, you can find excellent quality subwoofer cables at Ram Electronics. Ram Electronics is one of the most popular hardware stores in the world. They have subwoofer cables starting at around $13.00 You can find cables and other gadgets at fantastic prices here. The money you spend at Ram goes a long way. You could easily spend $20 at a large retailer and get cheap, junky cables. The same $20 at Ram can get you some excellent, high quality subwoofer cables. Best of the Best Audiophiles looking for the best subwoofer cables (and all other audio and video cables as well) should look no further than Nordost. Nordost is a Massachusetts company that manufactures some of the world's best A/V cables. They make every cable by hand and use their own special mix of metals for conductors and own special dielectric materials. Each cable is tested before it leaves the factory and all cables have a lifetime warranty. So remember that when you buy a new subwoofer for your audio or video subwoofer, it is only a piece of the puzzle. You need to buy subwoofer cables equally matched in quality to you subwoofer. It makes no sense to spend $500 on a powered subwoofer, only to connect it to your $1000 audio system with $5.00 speaker cable! Shop around and you can find yourself a deal on high-quality subwoofer cable without spending an exorbitant amount of money. |