Bananas Gone Bad!

I am currently in the process of extensively testing both speaker interconnects and termination.  Good cables and connectors absolutely make a huge difference both sonically and performance wise...not to mention long term reliability.  If there are any problems whatsoever from the rear of your amplifier out to your endeared speakers themselves...the results can be not only discouraging but indeed disastrous!

My poor AudioSource Amp 100 has been put through the ringer!  I have exhaustively used my prized reference fifty watt per channel power amplifier for not only enjoyable listening pleasure but also for evaluating countless interconnects and their various terminatioin.


It is to the AudioSource's credit that it is even alive and ticking aside from its current great performance!  The rear of the amp sports two rows of red and black five-way binding posts to accomodate two sets of speaker pairs.  I have learned much from my recent experimentation and have concluded that there simply is no substitution for quality...and that includes not only the cabling but their termination as well.


You just purchased great speaker wire as I have but need to make for good secure connection to your amplifier's rear.  The Parts Express Dual Banana Plug Black # 1498 arrived quickly enough at minimal cost on Amazon.Com but that is as far as the pleasantries go.


Aside from being one of those shipped from China/Singapore cheapies that fail...it just proves that sometimes you truly do get what you pay for.  The first problem is that the red and black pairs are not ideally color coded pairs as this type of joined-at-the-hip connector can easily lead to user mismatch and mistakes.  Keep your red and black connectors separated so as to not cause confusion at a later date.  


Secondly...and perhaps more importantly...I find fault with dual bananas as they sometimes twist and distort when plugging the connected pairs into the back of your receiver, amp or speakers.  In my case the first set of these cheapies when forced into the rear of the AudioSource snapped internally causing a modulated distortion sound that absolutely drove me nuts for awhile as I was unaware of the problem and felt that the Amp 100 was indeed failing.


If you look at the plug itself whether gold-plated or silver-plated [both are available from the vendor]...note that there is a cable guide path that is designed to hold your speaker cable with outside jacket.  The outside jacket should push through so that the two stripped ends will easily secure to the two set screws that will ultimately hold the bare wires.  Unfortunately this strain relief will not be effective with 16 gauge or larger wires!  Trying to force the cable through the strain relief will only result in crimped or worse yet...damaged wire.


The two small top/rear mounted set screws are small common types that unfortunately will only accept 16 gauge or smaller wires.  I don't even recommend anything smaller than 12 gauge cables these days when connecting to male banana plugs as I have learned the hard way [as many others have I'm sure] that heavy well made Oxygen Free Copper [OFC] is the only way to go with interconnects.  The heavier...the better.


Bottom line...DO NOT jeopardize your beautiful amplifier that sports five-way binding posts...you could blow the beloved beast!  I constantly read threads where so-called experts blew their expensive gear in exactly this manner.  Look...it's your hard earned cash.  Your amplifier is a creative thing of beauty.  Why take a chance on ruining it?  I even read one thread where this guy owned ten AudioSource Amp 100s and claimed half of them were dead.  I wonder why.  


By the way...those inadequate set screws on these bananas strip and wear out easily.  A best buy....NO WAY!  Sorry Parts Express...you are no champion of the poor man as better constructed single housed dual banana plugs made locally and overseas exist for almost the same price....PJSII

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