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Ten years ago, four audiophiles (including myself) got together for an experiment. Someone had written that a new wire sounded better than the standard cable of the day. That night, the four of us made 24 pairs of "homemade" audio interconnects from this new wire. Everything we had read was true: That new wire did indeed make a difference.
Only in the last few years have such differences in connectors and wires become widely discussed. Today, there are many types of speaker wire, component interconnects, and jacks that are supposed to affect a stereo's sound.
I recently followed up my experiment of 10 years back with another change in my system's connections. I had been using large spade lugs on my speaker wires, but they never really fit properly on the speakers or the amplifier. My speakers have five-way binding posts, which accept bare wires, spade lugs or banana plugs. I decided to replace the spade lugs with banana plugs to ensure maximum contact, and to get the best bananas I could find on the market.
What I found were Monster Cable's X-Terminators, oversized, high-tech, gold-plated banana plugs that lock into place. X-Terminators are also expensive-$25 for a pack of two, one red and one black, enough for one end of a speaker cable.
Unlike regular banana plugs, X-Terminators do not accept bare wires easily, save for the very thin wires that are currently all the rage in some circles.
Spade lugs, the size for #10 screws, work much better, and luckily I had Monster's own on my wires to begin with. These gold-plated lugs, which cost 750 each, can be crimped or soldered onto wire as thin as AWG 16 or as thick as AWG 10. They are about twice the size of regular spade lugs, so they won't fit into narrow barrier strips or spring-contact connectors. Nor will you be able to use them on closely spaced screw terminals.
The X-Terminator has two locking features that make all the difference: First, a twist of the X-Terminator body locks the spade lugs into place; a set screw (tightened with a supplied Allen wrench) ensures the spade-lug fit.
Second, a twist of the locking knob expands the banana prongs, which are split lengthwise into quarters for expansion. This locks the plug in place to ensure the tightest possible connection, secure even when plugged into the bottom of a speaker (as many sub woofers require) or when people accidentally step on or trip over the speaker wires.
Describing how they sound is quite a bit different from describing how they work, because this is a passive device and, technically, has no sound of its own. Instead, connectors allow sound to pass through, and if they do anything, they do it in a negative fashion; that is, they degrade the sound. Now, I had been happy with the sound of my system when using spade lugs, but I was even happier with it when using the X-Terminators. With the help of a friend, a series of single-blind tests were run, and I was able to pick out the X-Terminators, which I preferred. They are worth every penny, I'd say.
The manufacturer recommends that the plugs be treated with a contact conditioning chemical, such as Cramolin or Tweek, before use. The sound was the same, to me, whether the plugs were treated with the chemical conditioners or not.
Monster Cable's X-Terminators are the largest, most elaborate banana plugs available in this country for stereo connections. And although they require special connectors, adding slightly to the cost, they are worth the trouble and expense.
- Gary Krakow
(Editor's Note: X-Terminators are also available with black-anodized, insulated barrels for $25 per pair, and in a lower cost version, the Powerconnect II, priced at $17 per pair. The Power connect II requires a screwdriver to lock the banana barrel, and it has a female jack for piggybacking other banana plugs. -I.B.)
(adapted from Audio magazine, Jan. 1986)
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