Review on Mediabridge 12AWG Ultra Series Speaker Cable W/Dual Gold Plated Banana Tips (3 Feet) - CL2 Rated - High Strand Count Copper (OFC) Construction - Black [New &Amp by Carlos Henderson

I have Elac Unifi ub5 and Yamaha R-N803 speakers - I have used some generic I think 14AWG - just fairly cheap speaker cables without any sort of shielding - if you don't look at the outer insulation as a shield - I bought Monoprice banana plugs anyway but was too lazy to fit them in, but I also wanted to upgrade my cables a bit and have had quite good experiences with Mediabridge - I've bought long Cat5 network cables as well as a 25 foot subwoofer cable. I received 2 cables from Amazon in a timely manner but one of the speaker cable box seals was broken but the contents looked unused and brand new. the other box seal was intact. Part of the fun of delivery is unboxing - someone stole that experience from me! Okay, at least I could open the rest of the box. The cable is well constructed - stiff enough but not so stiff that it doesn't bend. it is flexible enough for some narrow applications. I went with pre-engineered, permanently soldered speaker wire with soldered termination and didn't use Monoprice banana plugs and speaker wire because they are "loose" - I actually put Monoprice banana plugs in my AVR setup - nothing. something is wrong, they seem to work, but i needed a strong piece of cable and shielding. Installing the Media Bridge speaker cables went smoothly as expected. The banana plug fits the yamaha and elacs snugly and snugly - it seems to fit and contact perfectly to carry power and sound. Speaking of sound - sounds great - is it better? I'm not sure, but I had a feeling it sounded better - I might do an A/B test one day if I wasn't so lazy! I don't regret the purchase but it's only been a few days. Thank you for reading. 10/21/19 - still works. Happy with purchase and upgrade