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Speaker Wire length

D

dweezil

pfm Member
Get the impression there could be some Naim users here so can anyone satisfy my idle curiosity?
Saw an article where a minimum speaker cable length was quoted for a Naim system.
Was it a misprint or is there some rationale?
I did reread
 
The party line is 3.5M lengths min.

Both lengths must be equal.

7M is the optimum length.

It had some validity in the old days, not so much now.
 
Yeah. Your amp will blow up then the naim police will come round and finish the job by torching your house.......
 
There was a safety omitted from the olive range poweramplifiers (zobel network). The speaker wire could then act as a replacement, provided it was long enough. Hence the 3.5m. The length assumes naim naca is being used, which is low capacity wire.
 
Naim amps - especially the older models & to a lesser extent the modern power amps need a high inductance & low capacitance load across the amp output stage.
All amps actually need this load but most all have it as an inductor coil inside the amp itself. Naim in their drive for the best sound choose to not have internal inductors + whatever you choose speaker cable & use the speaker cable & the speaker alone to do this.

If Naim NACA5 speaker cable is used, then you need 3.5m minimum, up to 20m max.
8 to 10m is considered the optimum length for the purist.

NACA5 has the following spec:
Capacitance: 16pF per metre
Resistance: 9 milliohms per metre
Inductance: 1uH per metre

Naim NACA5 & cables with a similar design get the high inductance & low capacitance with the wide & parallel conductor spacing.
If you go for another cable, its a good idea to get close to the Naim inducance spec for overall cable length. i.e. 3.5 x 1 = 3.5uH minimum per cable length, assuming that is that you can find whatever cable spec in the first place.
Failing that the cables to go for are the wide spaced conductors like Linn K20, some of the van den Hul's or the close spaced cables without a tight twist such as Chord, QED etc.
Cables to avoid are the high capacitance types typically that have a tight twist or even worse the plaited types.
Medium inductance & capacitance tend not to so much of an issue to modern Naim amps & to be honest, its whatever your ears & budget choose, but its a good idea to go for a leghth that is significantly longer than the 3.5m - say up to 5 or more - to get as near as you can to the 3.5uH per length as possible.
 
Yes Max, the thing is the Naim bad mouth'ers all tend to have one or more of unsuitable speaker cables with incorrect lengths, technicolored s-snake oil PVC interconnects, PSU's made in garden sheds in rural england, power cables that don't sarn' loik nuffink diffrunt, clanky flatpak racks made in Sweden, perfectly good amps trying to drive a pint sized speakers from Glasgow made in the 1980's that have the band width of a mobile phone.
Add to that the inability to understand basic electronic equipment operation logic & the perpensity to have chips on shoulders, its hardly surprising any Naim sounds bad.

...... might need to lay low for a while ....... :rolleyes: ;) :D
 
it was left out .[.the zobel network] to save cost/increase profit margin ..nothing more ...well perhaps a cynical marketing twist so you could only use there own make cable ....this of course is only in my opinion .
 
Is QED 79 safe to use and if so what length? Now I've got a reasonable amount invested in my amps I don't want to risk finding out myself if it isn't.
 
deltaunit said:
Is QED 79 safe to use and if so what length? Now I've got a reasonable amount invested in my amps I don't want to risk finding out myself if it isn't.
Click to expand...

79 strand is fairly benign, but why spoil the ship for a ha'porth or tar? Get NAC A5; it ain't expensive, esp. used !!!
 
I have some A5 already but would just like to know for any future 2nd system expansions. Getting the amp(s) before the speaker wire would obviously be a priority :)
 
QED 79strand will work just fine. The only real difference from NACA5 is the spacing, hence loop inductance/unit length, but it is well within the 'close enough' mark.
 
zanash said:
it was left out .[.the zobel network] to save cost/increase profit margin ..nothing more ...well perhaps a cynical marketing twist so you could only use there own make cable ....this of course is only in my opinion .
Click to expand...

Yes - the old Naim/RS cartel that passed profits from the sale of RS 56 strand (red and black) - twisted at 4 or 5 turns per metre.

NACA4 - "the improvement in sound will be quite small and only significant in a good system".

Bastards.
 
With Naim (and Exposure) amps, Just use some common sense.
Any cable using standard (non plaited and non twisted) conductors in a parallel configuration - so either dumbell or figure 8 - is going to be fine if you have a few metres+ per side.

The Naim recommendation for length re NACA4/5 is designed to guarantee stability.
 
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