RUNNING IN OF CABLES

Important Cable Facts Running-In: As with all audio components, audio cables require an adjustmentperiod. This is often mistakenly referred to as “break-in”. However, break-in is properly used todescribe a mechanical change-engines break-in, loudspeaker and phono cartridge suspensions breakin.A cable’s performance takes time to optimize because of the way a dielectric behaves (the way theinsulating material absorbs and releases energy), changes in the presence of a charge. Cables willcontinue to improve in sound or picture quality over a period of several weeks. This is the same reasonamplifiers, preamplifiers and CD players also require an adjustment period. The key difference between“adjusting” and “breaking-in” is that things don’t “un-break-in”, however, electrical components do “unadjust”.Several weeks of disuse will return a cable to nearly its original state.The run-in time is essentially the same for all cables. However, the apparent need for run-in varieswildly. As with amplifiers and other components, the better the cable, the less distortion it has, andtherefore the less there is to cover up the obnoxious distortion caused by being new. Since human perceptionis more aware of the existence of a distortion than the quantity, the better the cable, the worsein some ways it will sound when new, because the anemic forced two-dimensional effect reulting frombeing new will not be ameliorated by other gentler distortions. Please be patient when first listening toany superior product.Directionality: All cables are directional, from hardware store electrical cable to the finest pure silvercables. All AudioQuest cables are marked for direction. With other cables it might be necessary to simplylisten to the cables in one direction and then the other. The difference will be clear-in the correctdirection the music is more relaxed, pleasant and believable. While cable directionality is not fully understood,it is clear that the molecular structure of drawn metal is not symmetrical, providing a physicalexplanation for the existence of directionality.CABLE THEORYBiwiring: Many of today’s speakers can be biwired. This type of speaker has one input for the wooferand a separate input for the upper frequency ranges. This often leads to the question “is biwiring soimportant that I should spend twice as much on cable?” Maybe it is worth spending twice as much oncable in general, but that’s a separate question. Biwiring is a way to save money, to get higher performancefor the same price. The biwiring question is not about how much money to spend, but abouthow to get the most performance for one’s money. Biwiring is done in order to substantially reduce thedistortion caused by speaker cable. In a biwire set-up the cable feeding the higher ranges no longerhas to handle the large magnetic fields caused by the high current needed to produce bass. The bassfundamentals are not affected by biwiring, but the treble signal now travels a less distorted path. Alittle like the difference between swimming through waves versus through smooth water. The bass willsound better because bass difinition is in the midrange and higher. It is worthwhile to take advantageof the benefits of biwiring when the speaker manufacturer has gone to the extra expense of includingthis capability. At the very least, please connect a single set of speaker cables to the treble input, andthen use even a modest cable like AQ F-14 to jump down to the woofer. Please replace the jumperssupplied by the speaker manufacturer. These are self sabotage, by the speaker manufacturer and byany listener who uses them. Just like better electronics do not come with poor interconnect cables, it isbest to pretend your fine speakers did not come with stamped metal jumpers. When biwiring, the twocables used must either be identical, or have essentially identical designs. If the cables have differentinductance or capacitance, they will cause different amounts of phase shift. The integrity and coherenceof the speaker will be compromised.