How much does a speaker wire affect the way a system sounds?

I have really crappy speaker wire going to my subs right now, and i'm wondering if it would seriously be worth it to shell out a few bucks and buy the more expensive "monster" wire, or if the difference would be minimal.

 

how crappy? for something like your subs, i say no you wont be able to tell a difference.

on the other hand....you are probably using about 4-5 feet for the sub to amp, its not that expensive.

 

speaker wire is speaker wire. you can use a power cord off of a toaster for speaker wire and it'll sound exactly the same as the expensive monster cable stuff.

 

It's all about the size of wire...the larger wire, the more signal is transferred..........but it's easy to overkill. 16 gauge is a good standard, and make sure it's made of a good copper. Some cheap wires have tin and other cheaper metals, they corrode. You can also suffer a high freq. roll-off if you're running smaller wire, especially w/some length to it.
So yes, speaker wire does matter, but don't let a salesman tell you that.

 

actually.. the more pure the copper is the easier it corrodes. pure copper reacts with oxygen making copper oxide, which is that green corrosion on copper. but yes. the size of the wire does make the biggest difference.

 

also another thing about speaker wire, or wire in general: the more strands it contains the easier they are to work with. the better quality cables tend to be easier to work with.

 

True...but you won't see a pure copper wire. However, it conducts current very fast and efficiently...hence why it's used in Pro Audio. Besides, a good wire is insulated to prevent oxidation on the strands anyways, which eliminate this problem from occuring to begin with.

Of course pure copper corrodes, haha.

 

i still like my 12 guage.

 

please.. show me some speaker wire that isn't insulated. the insulation doesn't prevent oxidation on the contacts where you will see the most corrosion because it is removed to make a connection. either way, for subs it's not really gonna matter what kind of speaker wire you use. the main thing when it comes to speaker wire for subs is size, not quality.

 

Man...what's your deal?

No sh!t sherlock!! You keep pointing out the obvious here. I could get into the serious talk on here if you want, but that's not the point.
A good connector/clip on the end can usually decrease this problem a lot...not eliminate though.

As for the insulation, the degree varies from wire to wire.

I don't think we need to run this into the ground.