Silver plated interconnects - any real benefits?

Sheva

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A number of interconnects seems to be identified as both copper and silver, by which I assume the main conductor is copper with a silver external coat:? . Won’t the sound be still be governed by the predominantly copper presence, or are they a true halfway house between copper and silver? I would assume that to get any of the benefits/sound-effects associated with silver you would need to use 100% silver (and the real thing, not the 90%sterling material) ? Is the silver plating just a marketing gimmick?

 

stewartwen

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Sheva I suggest you check out Graham Slees site for the truth regarding silver plated copper cables. He talks good sense on the subject!

There is no bullshit on his site either, I use some of his interconnects and have found them very be very good. There used to be a section called AGSAT dealing with the building of hi quality cables. And the cost very little to construct too.

Stewart

 

Sheva

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stewartwen wrote:

Sheva I suggest you check out Graham Slees site for the truth regarding silver plated copper cables. He talks good sense on the subject!There is no bullshit on his site either, I use some of his interconnects and have found them very be very good. There used to be a section called AGSAT dealing with the building of hi quality cables. And the cost very little to construct too.

Stewart
Looks a good site
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Kev

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AFAIK silver coated copper cable became flavour of the month when cable manufacturers found Teflon was a very good low loss dielectric, or insulator as most people call it. Teflon attacks copper and so the conductor was coated in silver to protect it. Therefore the advantage of silver coated copper cable lies in the use of Teflon as the insulator. Electrical conductivity of both copper and silver is about the same, silver is a bit better, so any differences if any are likely to be in the impurities present in the wire.

Hope this answers the question, I'm keeping away from subjective judgements, I know what I like
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Kev

 

meninblack

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Kev wrote:

AFAIK silver coated copper cable became flavour of the month when cable manufacturers found Teflon was a very good low loss dielectric, or insulator as most people call it. Teflon attacks copper and so the conductor was coated in silver to protect it. Therefore the advantage of silver coated copper cable lies in the use of Teflon as the insulator. Electrical conductivity of both copper and silver is about the same, silver is a bit better, so any differences if any are likely to be in the impurities present in the wire.Hope this answers the question, I'm keeping away from subjective judgements, I know what I like
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Kev
Sorry, but this is an old wives tale. Copper wires with a teflon jacket are widely used in planes, missiles, the space shuttle.....

AFAIK silver plated copper conductors are only used in audiophool applications.

(PS my former employer used to make aerospace wire and cable, so I know what I'm on about!
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)

 

JANDL100

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As a broad generalisation (I'm good at those !
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) silver-plated copper cables have a slightly etched sound which accentuates leading edges and hence perceived detail.

At least that's what I find. Can be very effective in the right system - or when you want to pep the sound up a bit.

 

Kev

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meninblack wrote:

Sorry, but this is an old wives tale. Copper wires with a teflon jacket are widely used in planes, missiles, the space shuttle.....

AFAIK silver plated copper conductors are only used in audiophool applications.

(PS my former employer used to make aerospace wire and cable, so I know what I'm on about!
wink.png
)
Bugger! I'm normally a real cynic when it comes to adiophool claims but I bought the one about Teflon attacking copper.

I've just done some Google research to find out why so many hook up cables are silver caoted. As far as I've been able to find out, silver was used for it's skin effect in RF applications, which isthe applicationthe silver coated copper Teflon insulated cable was developed for. Still don't know why it's so popular though. For info, at work we use it in looms foran application that isn't RF, but the Teflon is resistant to the chemicals we use.

Kev

 

notaclue

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Silver plating copper is not perfect. There is a microscopic air gap between the copper and the silver where the silver doesn't stick properly.

As treble frequencies are lighter than bass frequencies, the treble will fall into this microscopic air gap. The result of this is that silver plated copper cablehas avery airy treble sound.

If you look at the cable under an electron microscope, you can actually see how the heavier bass frequencies push the lighter treble into the air gap. You can see it very clearly if youpass bass heavy reggae music along the cable. It's not as clear to see with chamber music.

 
E

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I suspect this configuration's popularity arises from one of many audiophool fables: "skin effect" - if electrons only travel on the surface of a conductor why not benefit from the most conductive metal there is without the expense of making the whole conductor from silver?

Problem is, when two different metals are placed in proximity, minute differences in electrical potential can cause bimetallic electrolysis, with one acting effectively as a sacrificial anode - though not a structural problem in coated wires, it's still usually necessary for this reason and to make an effective and permanent bond when plating a metal to use an intermediate such as nickel. Thus you end up with a sandwich of two good conductors effectively separated by a less good. For this reason, theoretically, silver plated wires are inferior to plain copper, and indeed in cheaper iterations such as the notorious QED silver anniversary this seems to pan-out in some of our experiences.

However, like all good broad, sweeping generalisations, there seem to be exceptions - the second best wanky wire I've ever used - TCI Cobra - uses silver-plated copper conductors, and is a superb interconnect. However it uses a teflon dielectric as opposed to the QED's polyethylene, and causes me to echo countless predecessors in wondering if the quality of the dielectric isn't at least as important, or even more important, than the quality of the conductor (within reason) ?

Only experimenation in your system will give you a personally meaningful answer to this...

churz, eofs

 

musicbox

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notaclue wrote:

Silver plating copper is not perfect. There is a microscopic air gap between the copper and the silver where the silver doesn't stick properly.As treble frequencies are lighter than bass frequencies, the treble will fall into this microscopic air gap. The result of this is that silver plated copper cablehas avery airy treble sound.

If you look at the cable under an electron microscope, you can actually see how the heavier bass frequencies push the lighter treble into the air gap. You can see it very clearly if youpass bass heavy reggae music along the cable. It's not as clear to see with chamber music.
A very neat summation of the Luftkopftheory of anti-social bass behaviour. Good one Notaclue.
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