cat5 for wall speakers?

[usproprty]

I am helping my friend rewire his old house with cat5e and rg6. My friend wanted to add surround sound to his game room and speakers throughout the house for music. I told him the only speakers I have installed would be paging speakers, so asking around another friend told him to use cat5 cable. I have used cat5 for paging speakers but I have never heard or cannot imagine using it for wall speakers with high end components. If someone has heard of this please tell me the good and the bad

 

[Bobg1]

The real question how much power does he plan to try to pump through it? That is where the size of the cable is critical. The small guage of cat 5 is not designed to handle high power. Personally I would use nothing smaller than 16 gauge for speakers like that.

 

[jeffmoss26]

I used cat 5 (used 2 pairs for red connection, 2 pairs for black connection)for speakers but it did not work well.
Now I am using 16 gauge shielded cable and it works fine. I cut some holes in the wall in my basement and put the speaker in there. jeff moss

 

[Sam92Legacy]

http://www.venhaus1.com/diycatfivecables.html

I came across this when I was looking for speaker building info; I haven't tried it (I would like to think I have better ways to spend a weekend), but there appear to be a large number of people who swear by the quality.

 

[daronwilson]

There are several vendors providing a solution for using Cat5 for speakers, however I believe those are low level solutions, and were designed for people who already had Cat5 installed and needed to do some audio with it.

If you go to the store where you get professional audio equipment, they will be glad to tell you that you should you a heavy gage, high strand count copper stranded wire for your speaker leads.

I agree that 16 gage would be a minimum for home audio, we stock 16 and 14, and the choice is normally made based on the length of the run and the overall power anticipated in the system. He will be much happier with the correct wire. Be sure the wire you get is class 2 rated for placement inside a wall, some of the speaker wire out there is not.

Good Luck! It is only my opinion, based on my experience and education...I am always willing to learn, educate me!
Daron J. Wilson, RCDD
daron.wilson@lhmorris.com

 

[Bobg1]

sam92legacy
I agree, I have better ways to spend my time.
If one is to spend this kind of time on the cables, I sure hope they also have the funds available to properly et up the room they are going to be listening in. If everyhting is not acoustically right, it would be a big waste of time.
A "normal" person in a regular home environment would probably not be able to notice any difference.

 

[daronwilson]

Wow, this dude had way too much time on his hands.

First...unless you have acoustic tile and a completely acoustically designed/decorated room (i.e. sound studio quality), I would wager you could not tell the difference in quality speaker wires for short runs from the amp to the speaker.

Second...there are a few theory flaws in the article, but things like "teflon is a great insulator" then he tells you to strip back the PVC jacket but not the PVC insulation. You would need plenemn wire to get teflon, then you may or may not get teflon...you will likely get a mix of insulating components.

But hey, thanks for opening my eyes to this, I've never thought of making speaker cables that way...pretty interesting.

It is only my opinion, based on my experience and education...I am always willing to learn, educate me!
Daron J. Wilson, RCDD
daron.wilson@lhmorris.com

 

[usproprty]

Thank's for the help guys, I knew it didn't seem right.

 

[rpearson]

I recently installed a moderatly sizable home theatre system using high end Yamaha components,and using 2-cond\18AWG wire.Works great.

 

[baltimore]

speaker wire was made for 1 thing and 1 thing only!!!!!!!!
solid telephone wire was made for 1 thing and 1 thing only!!!

 

[rbertram]

Here is a link for someone that out a lot of time and testing into making high quality speaker wire from CAT5.

http://www.venhaus1.com/diycatfivecables.html