Speaker cables are available in a wide range and cable you choose will greatly affect the quality of your speakers. There are also different speaker cables for a regular stereo and home theatre setup. There is also a great difference between cables for floor speakers and bookshelves.

For regular music setups, longer cables may not be required as opposed for home theatre use which will likely need them. Because of the impedance from the long length, the longer the cable runs the more likely will it have a loss of quality sound.

To apply this, look at the longer cables with lower resistance and RFI (Radio Frequency Interference) cancelling to have the best sound possible.

Using the right speaker cables for any given system has several factors to be considered. Speaker impedance is one thing that needs to be taken into consideration.

Characteristically speaking, speakers usually have an impedance rating of 2, 4, 8 or 16 ohms and this can typically be found somewhere on the speaker (most likely, but not always, on the back). The unit of measure used for speaker impedance is an ohm. It is just on rare occasions but normally the speakers should come with some form or leaflet that will have the information listed.

After discovering the speaker impedance, find the correct connector for the cables whether you are at a store or looking online. Then check out the speaker itself to see the connection ports, and it will help you to know the variety of speaker cables that you need.

There are connectors called banana plugs which are single or dual, others could be single prong which will be an eight inch or quarter inch size cable or a three point connector which is usually red, yellow and white.

After establishing the type of the connector and the impedance rating, you can now proceed with choosing the required length of the cable. You can possible estimate the distance, take measurements if you want, the length needed to connect the speakers to components in addition to other reflections.

Aside from shopping tips, this writer also regularly pens articles regarding speaker wiring and rca jacks to speaker wire.