Bi-wireing speakers

I am curious about Bi-wireing. For many years I have been Bi-amping, I recently moved and have no room for my equipment. I have been reading about Bi-wireing on the web and am confused. All the drawing show two sets of cables coming off either side of the Amp, one set going to the low freq. speaker and one set going to the High Freq. speaker. I would think a 300 Watt Amp could blow a tweeter and you would need some kind of crossover unless they are considering and not showing the speakers internal crossover. What would be the advantage of running two sets of cables to the same terminal on a speaker. Being most cables have their own characteristic I would think that can improve the sound if you had a good match.
Bi-wiring is a DIRECTIONAL double run of speaker cables terminated “2 - 4 “ ..... single amp to upper and lower speaker posts on each speaker in lieu of a link or jumper connection.

In contrast Bi-amping is separate “2- 2” X 2 ( one full set per separate amp) I.e. 4 - 4 configuration

Shotgunned speaker configuration is a doubled up 4 cable thickness instead of just 2) configured 2 - 2 with a similar short jumper pair linking the upper and lower driver speaker posts on each speaker

Without prejudice that the absolute audio performance benefits are ALWAYS system dependent, a section of the high-end quality build hi-end speaker cable brands are actually moving away from bi-wiring (2 - 4 configuration) in favour of the shotgunned cable runs and jumpers above.

Biamping ... Different story.

E.g. NORDOST ... ctions.pdf

CHORD ... ngle-wire/

".... Many hi-fi and home cinema loudspeakers have two pairs of binding posts. This allows the speaker to be either bi-wired using two sets of loudspeaker cable or bi-amped using two amplifiers.

As a general rule (and there will always be exceptions) we tend to find that bi-wiring will open out the sound stage and increase perceived levels of detail. However, single wiring will often sound the most musically coherent. There is also an issue with single and bi-wire speaker cables. In all the research we have carried out, a single wire speaker cable out-performs a bi-wire cable of equivalent cost. This makes a lot of sense; the single wire speaker cable has two high quality conductors and the bi-wire cable requires four. So for a given budget, we believe that a single wire cable will always out-perform the equivalent bi-wire cable, so much so that we no longer produce dedicated bi-wire cables..."


I experimented with various brand bi-wires versus shotgunned in my $40K 2-channel system.

For me, a pair of shotgunned NORDOST Frey’s with their matched FREY shotgunned jumpers bested all comers , single, bi-wire or bi-amped ......full stop. I concur with the mfg articles above ..... The audio performance improvement differences were not subtle IN MY SYSTEM.

in contrast VANDERSTEEN supports bi-wiring speaker arrays ..... So go figger!!!

My integrated is a $15K hi-end, hi-current, 170 WPC into 8 ohms Quality build 60-lb. heavy beast , with massive power supplies. (the WPC output rating is meaningless in isolation) with a vast surplus of “grunt.”.

There is no danger of ever blowing any of my 4-way speaker drivers unless one stupidly inserted a different (cheap) amp driven so hard to the extreme that it starts to clip and thus distort. This is Usually only experienced by fools with cheap build gear and near deafness hearing health but still overkranking out party hard rock at Deafening levels..... and/ or with completely grossly mismatched equipment and speakers)


@akg_ca , 
Nice post.
OP, as akg said there is a lot of divergent material on bi wiring speakers.
But, if it didn't do anything, why offer it?
Vandersteen believes it to be a significant improvement. And, using 2 separate runs is the best, most complete way to implement bi wiring.
Just because you are using separate cables doesn't mean your 300wpc amp is going to me more capable of blowing out your speakers.
A 300wpc amp is going to blow out your speaker if you either are over driving the speaker(distortion), or clipping the amp(distortion, too).
If you play music at a reasonable level, you probably aren't using more than a few watts. It is the transients that tax an amplifier to reproduce properly, and those extra 290 or so watts give you headroom to produce an undistorted signal.
I recently contacted Vivid Audio and they are moving away from making biwire or biamping available.
I follow Vandersteen's suggestion....never had trouble. 
"What would be the advantage of running two sets of cables to the same terminal on a speaker. "

There are no advantages to running two pair of wires to a speaker terminal.  That configuration is electrically identical to running one pair of similar diameter wire to the terminal.   
It can vary depending on how the speaker is designed.  Seems like some manufacturers believe it provides a sonic benefit and design their speakers accordingly, while others just put high and low terminals on there because they feel they have to.  Then there are others that just don't feel biwiring is necessary and just provide one pair of terminals. 

To me, if the designer recommends biwiring it is certainly worth exploring.  IMO, at the very least you'll want to replace the crappy jumpers that usually come with the speakers and replace with good quality wire jumpers.  You have to weigh the cost of what it takes to biwire your speakers vs. the sonic benefit, as you might find you'll get a bigger overall boost in performance by investing that money elsewhere in your system. 

The last consideration is whether to go with a full shotgun biwire setup, where you have two separate cables going to each speaker.  This is where I actually found the largest benefit with MY speakers.  In addition to getting rid of the wretched jumper, you've now got twice the amount of cable going to you speakers, which decreases resistance that could provide further benefits -- again very much dependent on your system.  This option, however, can get very expensive depending on what cables you're using.  While I got enough benefit from this to find it a worthwhile improvement, I wouldn't have done it until I had my other components where I want them since the benefits were of a more subtle variety versus upgrading something like a preamp. 

One final tip.  Despite already running a shotgun loom of cables, a cable manufacturer recommended I add banana wire jumpers in addition to the dual cables (the cables had spade connectors so banana connectors were not being used).  I was, to say the least, skeptical, but I was shocked that these extra jumpers provided a meaningful improvement both in overall clarity and transparency along with tighter and more well-defined bass.  Not huge, but very noticeable to the point that I wouldn't think of using my speakers without them.  The good news is, in the scheme of audio, this is a relatively cheap tweak to try.  Anyway, I've blabbed too long here.  Hope this helped and best of luck. 
the expanding and collapsing larger firld of the bass signal modulates the HF
just physics...
however IF you choose an internal biwire OR dont physically seperate the run by about 4” the benefit is mitigated, leading many to an erroneous conclusion.....

I think the comments about system, system synergy, etc spot on....

listen.... a good relationship w dealer should allow for demo of some of the competing configuration.....

have fun, it is after all ALL about the music...
i have a set of 9’ Audio quest Type 6 in a shot gun bi-wire configuration, easy to test and hear the difference....just zip tie the runs together to simulate an internal biwire config, then cut zip ties and seperate by 4” along the run. They are terminated w Vandersteen sized spades at the speaker end, Vandy owners welcome to borrow and experiment.......

just PM me


Vintage Crack Audio  - An Intentional Not for Profit
I have been following the thread about the Doug Schroeder technique for interconnects, and I think it parallels this thread.
The use of a second pair of cables seems to not only improve speaker cables, but interconnects, as well.
Why or how, I can't say. But, practice does seem to have merit.
This is a very interesting thread but what Tomic601 says does seem to play out in real life. So if you have the money run two seperate speaker cables for your bi-wire setup. It does sound better.
AQ's "Rocket" line make great bi-wire cables as they're already separated into 2 runs per cable...I use a pair and they're an easy solution that are well made, well thought out (has 'em explained to me by Bill Low himself at a a local audio joint) excellent sounding cables.
I own the GO-4's and they are a considerable upgrade from the Rockefeller's I owned previously. The price wasn't crazy either.
The best way is to have all separate wires.  - 8 all together.