Getting ready to install those outdoor speakers you bought in your landscape, huh? You got everything you need, right? I am guessing that your purchased the following: Outdoor speakers, check! Amplifier, check! Burial grade speaker wire...what? You mean you bought just standard speaker wire from the store? This will never do! Sure it might work for a while, but soon the elements will deteriorate it and it will crack. Soon as it does you got a short issue that can result in a blown speaker. Or worse, a blown amplifier!
So what makes burial grade speaker wire better? Lets first look at the make up, shall we? Standard speaker cable you use in your home has either two sets of wire made of either copper or aluminum or a combination of both. Obviously 100% copper is the best conductor to use for your speakers because it transfers the signal with the least amount of resistance. And of course you need to use the recommended wire gage for your speakers, so look at the specifications of yours to determine this. Speaker wires for home or car use have a plastic coating around the inner conductor to protect them from coming into contact with each other and any other exterior metal that might cause a short. This is the most common type of speaker wire. Burial grade cable has some of the same elements as standard wire, but with added weather protection. This type of cable comes in both 2 conductor and 4 conductor versions. Conductors? Okay, speaker wire has a positive (+) wire and a negative (-) wire. This is a 2 conductor cable. A 4 conductor has two sets of positive and two sets of negative wires which allows stereo hook up of both the right and left channels. Make sense? Now back to the "exciting" stuff! Burial cable usually consists of 2 or 4 conductors of copper wire, in individual plastic coating. For example, it can be one red, one black, one green and one blue. Color doesn't really matter, it just helps you to keep them distinguished when hooking them up. These 4 color coded conductors are also encapsulated in a weather resistant outer coating, usually black, that helps protect it from moisture, heat, cold and breakage. Utilizing this type of wire for your outdoor speakers not only will get the sound were you want it but it will last for many, many years to come.

Okay, so what have we learned? We have learned that standard speaker wire and burial grade speaker wire are different when it comes to use outside your home. If you choose to use standard wire for your outdoor speakers, you run the risk of wire breakage and deterioration due to the elements. The chance that the wire will short and cause damage to your speakers and amplifier is possible. So why would you take the chance? Why would you want to have to pull them out of the ground and re-install them again? If this is what you really want to do and you like the thought of having to repeat your burial work a second time, then by all means, use standard wire! But, if you are like me, and don't like doing things twice, then do them right the first time. Don't you agree?

The Outdoor Speaker Guy