[Here In Oregon]

I have two Grace 101 preamps that I want to use in my studio and wanted to
know if somebody could tell me how to wire these units. I have custom built
Canare star quad balanced cables coming from the Grace units and I am
hooking it up to a Mogami 2932 snake feeding the Apogee AD-16X. I am
getting 60 hertz ground cycle hum from both Grace 101 units. All of my
other 14 preamps flowing through this snake are dead quiet but they are
hooked up differently.

The Canare cables are wired: Neutrik Female XLR to Male XLR
Two whites to pin # 2
Two blues to pin # 3
Shield to pin #3

The Mogami snake 2932 cables are wired: Neutrik Female XRL to a DB-25 multi
pin connector
The different colored wires in the snake go to pin # 2
The drain/ground wire goes to pin # 3
The black wire is not connected. Pin #1 is empty

I have an idea of what is wrong but I wanted to get opinions from those who
have done a lot of wiring and soldering.
My back muscles are killing me as I have been soldering for a couple of days
now and I hope I am saying this right and pardon my stupidity.

[PStamler]

On Sunday, January 6, 2013 8:38:20 PM UTC-6, Here In Oregon wrote:
I have two Grace 101 preamps that I want to use in my studio and wanted to

know if somebody could tell me how to wire these units. I have custom built

Canare star quad balanced cables coming from the Grace units and I am

hooking it up to a Mogami 2932 snake feeding the Apogee AD-16X. I am

getting 60 hertz ground cycle hum from both Grace 101 units. All of my

other 14 preamps flowing through this snake are dead quiet but they are

hooked up differently.



The Canare cables are wired: Neutrik Female XLR to Male XLR

Two whites to pin # 2

Two blues to pin # 3

Shield to pin #3

Shield should go to pin #1.

The Mogami snake 2932 cables are wired: Neutrik Female XRL to a DB-25 multi

pin connector

The different colored wires in the snake go to pin # 2

The drain/ground wire goes to pin # 3

The black wire is not connected. Pin #1 is empty

Pin #1 on an XLR cable should not be empty.

I have an idea of what is wrong but I wanted to get opinions from those who
have done a lot of wiring and soldering.

My back muscles are killing me as I have been soldering for a couple of days
now and I hope I am saying this right and pardon my stupidity.

I assume the snake doesn't end in the DB25, but continues to XLRs at the other end. Pin 1 of the male should connect with Pin 1 of the female, Pin 2 should connect with Pin 2, Pin 3 with Pin 3.

Wire up a Canare cable right first, then use it to connect one Grace to the Apogee. Do the same with another properly-wired Canare cable and the other Grace. Once that setup is aorking without hum, wire up the snake properly and try using it.

Peace,
Paul

[Gareth Magennis]

"Here In Oregon" wrote in message
...

I have two Grace 101 preamps that I want to use in my studio and wanted to
know if somebody could tell me how to wire these units. I have custom
built Canare star quad balanced cables coming from the Grace units and I
am hooking it up to a Mogami 2932 snake feeding the Apogee AD-16X. I am
getting 60 hertz ground cycle hum from both Grace 101 units. All of my
other 14 preamps flowing through this snake are dead quiet but they are
hooked up differently.

The Canare cables are wired: Neutrik Female XLR to Male XLR
Two whites to pin # 2
Two blues to pin # 3
Shield to pin #3

The Mogami snake 2932 cables are wired: Neutrik Female XRL to a DB-25
multi pin connector
The different colored wires in the snake go to pin # 2
The drain/ground wire goes to pin # 3
The black wire is not connected. Pin #1 is empty

I have an idea of what is wrong but I wanted to get opinions from those
who have done a lot of wiring and soldering.
My back muscles are killing me as I have been soldering for a couple of
days now and I hope I am saying this right and pardon my stupidity.



If I am reading that right, the DB25 has a different coloured wire and a
black wire connected to the two balanced input connections, plus a ground
wire, for each of the 8 inputs. If the black wire is not connected to
anything then only one of the balanced inputs of the the AD 16X is in
circuit.
The two conductors in each cable of the multicore need to go to pins 2 and 3
of the XLR, the ground to pin 1 being an option, depending on if it causes a
ground loop or not.



Gareth.

[Sean Conolly]

"Here In Oregon" wrote in message
...

Useful reference to bookmark, if you're making your own cables.

http://www.rane.com/note110.html

Sean

[Frank Stearns]

"Here In Oregon" writes:

I have two Grace 101 preamps that I want to use in my studio and wanted to
know if somebody could tell me how to wire these units. I have custom built
Canare star quad balanced cables coming from the Grace units and I am
hooking it up to a Mogami 2932 snake feeding the Apogee AD-16X. I am
getting 60 hertz ground cycle hum from both Grace 101 units. All of my
other 14 preamps flowing through this snake are dead quiet but they are
hooked up differently.

The Canare cables are wired: Neutrik Female XLR to Male XLR
Two whites to pin # 2
Two blues to pin # 3
Shield to pin #3

Why not shields to pin 1? Or, if you're star-grounding, why connect the shields?


The Mogami snake 2932 cables are wired: Neutrik Female XRL to a DB-25 multi
pin connector
The different colored wires in the snake go to pin # 2
The drain/ground wire goes to pin # 3
The black wire is not connected. Pin #1 is empty

Yikes. You've unbalanced the system. The Apogee is balanced in; you'd want to
maintain balancing.

I have 18 channels of Grace preamps here; one of their many lovely attributes is the
ability to hang an awful lot of cable length on the outputs as well as the inputs.

But they do demand a balanced environment to take advantage of their super clean
performance. You do not want to unbalance them. You can probably lift the output
shields if you really need to but I'd start with them connected. (If you DO lift
them you'd still want an RF ground, which you can do with a 51 ohm resistor
and 10 nf cap in series between the shield wire and connector pin 1.)

Also, how much length of the star-quad are you running? That stuff has 50+ pf/ft
which can start to hurt your HF response. Again, the Grace output balancing is quite
good; if it's going into a similar-quality balanced input there's likely no need to
run star-quad unless you've got a 50 KW AM transmitter in your back yard.

I'm in a terrible RF soup here with a 50K transmitter just across the Columbia river
(we're in Vancouver, just north of you if you're in PDX). Dead clean with standard
cabling. My work is primarily location, in all sorts of environs. Never any
problems, even in places other recordists in town have had RF issues.

I have an idea of what is wrong but I wanted to get opinions from those who
have done a lot of wiring and soldering.
My back muscles are killing me as I have been soldering for a couple of days
now and I hope I am saying this right and pardon my stupidity.

Well, I'd start by balancing the system and see if that doesn't clear the problem.

Frank
Mobile Audio



























--

[Here In Oregon]

Hey thanks Paul, Gareth, Sean and Frank.

I am still confused and will be reading the Rane article. I have seen that
link in the past but it wasn't that applicable to what I do, but seeing here
that I am wearing more hats these days because of the economy, I am trying
to learn and do more stuff.

I was the guy about five or six years ago that flew that engineer's engineer
out for six weeks to help build me another studio. He did all of the
wiring, soldering and guidance on room treatment. I am more of an artist
and a producer who likes presets ;-)

I have never claimed to be an honored and revered engineer, and have
augmented many situations by asking questions here at rec.audio.pro.
Whatever happened to that Fletcher dude? LOL!!!

No seriously, without the help of an engineer in my studio anymore I have
been putting out some slamming mixes because I got put into the ballpark and
down on the field and shown the batters box thanks to a ton of people over
the years including many of you.

Now I must go read that Rane article and start writing my obituary but will
report back on this ground problem if the soldering doesn't kill me first.

Thanks again,
HIO

[Scott Dorsey]

In article , Here In Oregon wrote:

I have two Grace 101 preamps that I want to use in my studio and wanted to
know if somebody could tell me how to wire these units. I have custom built
Canare star quad balanced cables coming from the Grace units and I am
hooking it up to a Mogami 2932 snake feeding the Apogee AD-16X. I am
getting 60 hertz ground cycle hum from both Grace 101 units. All of my
other 14 preamps flowing through this snake are dead quiet but they are
hooked up differently.

Draw a diagram of where the grounds go.

The rule: every device in the system needs to have one and only one ground
path to every other device. Never zero, never two.

Your goal as engineer is to figure out how to make this work out without
breaking safety grounds.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Sean Conolly]

"Here In Oregon" wrote in message
...
Hey thanks Paul, Gareth, Sean and Frank.

I am still confused and will be reading the Rane article. I have seen
that link in the past but it wasn't that applicable to what I do, but
seeing here that I am wearing more hats these days because of the economy,
I am trying to learn and do more stuff.

I was the guy about five or six years ago that flew that engineer's
engineer out for six weeks to help build me another studio. He did all of
the wiring, soldering and guidance on room treatment. I am more of an
artist and a producer who likes presets ;-)

I have never claimed to be an honored and revered engineer, and have
augmented many situations by asking questions here at rec.audio.pro.
Whatever happened to that Fletcher dude? LOL!!!

No seriously, without the help of an engineer in my studio anymore I have
been putting out some slamming mixes because I got put into the ballpark
and down on the field and shown the batters box thanks to a ton of people
over the years including many of you.

Now I must go read that Rane article and start writing my obituary but
will report back on this ground problem if the soldering doesn't kill me
first.


There's really not that much to it: pin 2 to 2 and 3 to 3, and connect pin 1
to the shield or drain wire only, not to the connector shell. It may not be
best for every piece of gear out there, but it should work fine with any
kind of newer quality gear.

Sean

[Gareth Magennis]

"Sean Conolly" wrote in message
...
"Here In Oregon" wrote in message
...
Hey thanks Paul, Gareth, Sean and Frank.

I am still confused and will be reading the Rane article. I have seen
that link in the past but it wasn't that applicable to what I do, but
seeing here that I am wearing more hats these days because of the
economy, I am trying to learn and do more stuff.

I was the guy about five or six years ago that flew that engineer's
engineer out for six weeks to help build me another studio. He did all
of the wiring, soldering and guidance on room treatment. I am more of
an artist and a producer who likes presets ;-)

I have never claimed to be an honored and revered engineer, and have
augmented many situations by asking questions here at rec.audio.pro.
Whatever happened to that Fletcher dude? LOL!!!

No seriously, without the help of an engineer in my studio anymore I have
been putting out some slamming mixes because I got put into the ballpark
and down on the field and shown the batters box thanks to a ton of people
over the years including many of you.

Now I must go read that Rane article and start writing my obituary but
will report back on this ground problem if the soldering doesn't kill me
first.


There's really not that much to it: pin 2 to 2 and 3 to 3, and connect pin
1 to the shield or drain wire only, not to the connector shell. It may not
be best for every piece of gear out there, but it should work fine with
any kind of newer quality gear.

Sean




This is the problem;

The Mogami snake 2932 cables are wired: Neutrik Female XRL to a DB-25 multi
pin connector
The different colored wires in the snake go to pin # 2
The drain/ground wire goes to pin # 3
The black wire is not connected. Pin #1 is empty



Gareth.

[Here In Oregon]

"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message
Draw a diagram of where the grounds go. The rule: every device in the
system needs to have one and only one ground
path to every other device. Never zero, never two.


Thanks Scott!!!!

Correction to my original post in this thread. Very sorry!!!

The XLR cable coming from the Grace 101 is wired two different ways on each
end (sorry). I assumed they were wired the same.

Grace side Canare XLR
Two whites to pin # 2
Two blues to pin # 3
pin #1 is open

Mogami side Canare XLR
Two whites to pin #2
Two blues to pin #3
Pin #1 is grounded


"Scott Dorsey" wrote in message
Your goal as engineer is to figure out how to make this work out without
breaking safety grounds.

Is cheating allowed??? I made a call to Grace Design; pulling out my
soldering gear as I type this and will report back.

[Here In Oregon]

"Here In Oregon" wrote in message
Is cheating allowed??? I made a call to Grace Design; pulling out my
soldering gear as I type this and will report back.

Argghhhh!!! Finished wiring one cable differently for the suggested fix
and the hum has been noticeably diminished but so has the volume :-(

I quit!!! I will never even make it as an Engineer's assistant, whatever
you call that; like a Sous Chef. I have another project I have to start
mixing tonight and my client in Louisiana is waiting for me to show him how
to upload his project to my SkyDrive. Thank you Microsoft for Windows
Remote, PSR tool, and Expression screen capture. Hmmm, first time I ever
thanked them before.

Thanks guys.

[Mike Rivers[_2_]]

On 1/7/2013 2:03 PM, Here In Oregon wrote:

I was the guy about five or six years ago that flew that engineer's
engineer out for six weeks to help build me another studio. He did all
of the wiring, soldering and guidance on room treatment. I am more of an
artist and a producer who likes presets ;-)

This sort of wiring is pretty straightforward stuff and it's well
documented. The Rane application note 110 deals mostly with how to
interconnect balanced (2 wire + shield) with unbalanced (1 wire +shield)
equipment and it's a good reference.

Today there aren't may people willing to pay for a consultant because
"all I need to know is on the Web" so you pretty much need to get an
understanding of it and be ready to figure these things out on your own.
It's not hard, and it will make you a better engineer when you
understand why things are the way they are.


--
For a good time, call http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com

[Mike Rivers[_2_]]

On 1/7/2013 6:55 PM, Here In Oregon wrote:

Correction to my original post in this thread. Very sorry!!!

The XLR cable coming from the Grace 101 is wired two different ways on
each end (sorry). I assumed they were wired the same.

Grace side Canare XLR
Two whites to pin # 2
Two blues to pin # 3
pin #1 is open

Mogami side Canare XLR
Two whites to pin #2
Two blues to pin #3
Pin #1 is grounded

If you mean by "Pin 1 is grounded" that it's connected to the shield,
you have a cable suitable for making a balanced connection, with the
shield connected at one end only. This is a technique that used to be
pretty popular for fixing hum caused by a ground loop but these days
it's somewhat frowned upon in favor of fixing the real problem.


--
For a good time, call http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com

[Ron Capik[_3_]]

On 1/7/2013 8:22 PM, Here In Oregon wrote:
"Here In Oregon" wrote in message
Is cheating allowed??? I made a call to Grace Design; pulling out my
soldering gear as I type this and will report back.

Argghhhh!!! Finished wiring one cable differently for the suggested
fix and the hum has been noticeably diminished but so has the volume :-(

I quit!!! I will never even make it as an Engineer's assistant,
whatever you call that; like a Sous Chef. I have another project I have
to start mixing tonight and my client in Louisiana is waiting for me to
show him how to upload his project to my SkyDrive. Thank you Microsoft
for Windows Remote, PSR tool, and Expression screen capture. Hmmm,
first time I ever thanked them before.

Thanks guys.


My fall back position would be to direct wire the boxes
and sort out the snake problem later, as time allows.

There's a lot of logic that goes in to sorting this stuff
out. As the system gets more complex the time needed
to sort tings out goes up. Sometimes the less elegant
solution is more efficient. Getting the job done often
trumps elegant, but don't forget to go back and fix things
right ...as time allows.

==
Later....
Ron Capik
--

[Here In Oregon]

"Mike Rivers" wrote in message ...

On 1/7/2013 2:03 PM, Here In Oregon wrote:

I was the guy about five or six years ago that flew that engineer's
engineer out for six weeks to help build me another studio. He did all
of the wiring, soldering and guidance on room treatment. I am more of an
artist and a producer who likes presets ;-)

This sort of wiring is pretty straightforward stuff and it's well
documented. The Rane application note 110 deals mostly with how to
interconnect balanced (2 wire + shield) with unbalanced (1 wire +shield)
equipment and it's a good reference.

Today there aren't may people willing to pay for a consultant because
"all I need to know is on the Web" so you pretty much need to get an
understanding of it and be ready to figure these things out on your own.
It's not hard, and it will make you a better engineer when you
understand why things are the way they are.


1. I help people all of the time on a myriad of issues, story of my life,
and I build all of my computers, etc. blah, blah, blah.
2. I cannot even begin to name all of the engineers that I have employed
over the years.
3. I am doing things that I am not accustomed to doing because the economy
is not great, if you haven't noticed.
4. Some people are good at fishing and like to fish. I do not.
5. The world is made up of a lot of people with specialized skills.
5. Do not lecture me; if you do not want to help then be quiet.
6. You have helped me in the past and I am very thankful for that.
7. I have mentioned your name, Scott and others on many forums etc. to
people with questions I could not answer..... even like a week or two ago. I
am sorry if they were not paying customers.
8. I have a project to mix now and I am sorry you are not here to help and I
do not have the funds to fly you here because you live out of my state.

Moderator!!!!!

[Scott Dorsey]

Ron Capik wrote:

My fall back position would be to direct wire the boxes
and sort out the snake problem later, as time allows.

Draw it out on paper. Draw it all out, with each contact marked and all
of the connector shells shown.

Once you see it on paper it will become easier.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[[email protected]]

Suggestion to the op
Use only standard cables that are wires 1to1 in the standard way.
If you have gear that won,t work with these, don't make non standard cables , instead make up a few patch boxes.
These are boxes with connectors on them that you can use to wire said connectors together in whatever way is needed.
This allows you to have enough space to solder and use resistors, capacitors or even transformers as required to achieve the
Interface needed.
Non standard cables will in the future be mistaken for standard cables and cause more,head aches.
Mark

[Frank Stearns]

"Here In Oregon" writes:

snips

Correction to my original post in this thread. Very sorry!!!

The XLR cable coming from the Grace 101 is wired two different ways on each
end (sorry). I assumed they were wired the same.

Grace side Canare XLR
Two whites to pin # 2
Two blues to pin # 3
pin #1 is open

Mogami side Canare XLR
Two whites to pin #2
Two blues to pin #3
Pin #1 is grounded

The above should work -- so perhaps there's something awry with the XLR-to-DB25
cable required to get into the Apogee. (The Apogee IS balanced in, so you'd want to
check on that wiring. Your Apogee manual should show how they do their DB25; you
can then see if your cable matches.)

Is cheating allowed??? I made a call to Grace Design; pulling out my
soldering gear as I type this and will report back.

Not cheating at all, and they are generally very good folks there.

Now, on the XLR-to-DB25... there are all sorts of ways to do those.
There's a sort-of standard that Tascam came out with years ago that many
manufacturers follow, but I don't know if Apogee does. Or maybe Apogee does but your
interface cable does not.

You might have gotten lucky with the other pres because their outputs were faux
balanced and could take a mis-wiring up to a point, whereas the Grace is true
balanced and it really needs to see a balanced input.

When I first got my Grace 201, I attempted to run its output unbalanced into a sound
card -- and had RFI issues (as I noted before, lots of RF here).

But once the output was run into a properly balanced input, dead quiet -- just that
nice clean signal.

Good luck with it,

Frank
Mobile Audio
--

[Gareth Magennis]

"Here In Oregon" wrote in message
...
"Here In Oregon" wrote in message
Is cheating allowed??? I made a call to Grace Design; pulling out my
soldering gear as I type this and will report back.

Argghhhh!!! Finished wiring one cable differently for the suggested fix
and the hum has been noticeably diminished but so has the volume :-(




In that case I would suspect the D25 is wired incorrectly.
The correct wiring is here on psge 11.

http://apogeedigital.com/pdf/ad16x_usersguide.pdf



Its similar to the Tascam format, except that the grounds are all shown as
connected together at the DSUB rather than connecting each screen of each
core to a different pin, effectively saying you don't use these multicore
grounds at the DSUB end at all (??).

That's a bit odd.


Gareth.

[Mike Rivers[_2_]]

On 1/8/2013 3:35 AM, Gareth Magennis wrote:

In that case I would suspect the D25 is wired incorrectly.

There are several different wiring conventions for DB25 audio
connectors. The TASCAM wiring is most common but if you don't know what
you're buying, you could get the wrong thing.

There's a collection on my web page of all of the different systems that
I could find at the time, which is probably pretty comprehensive. Mr.
Oregon, get out your continuity checker and a pencil and trace out the
wiring for yours.

[Here In Oregon]

"Mike Rivers" wrote in message ...

There's a collection on my web page of all of the different systems that
I could find at the time, which is probably pretty comprehensive.

Mr. Oregon, get out your continuity checker and a pencil and trace out
the
wiring for yours.



Yes sir!!! I love my Fluke.

[Here In Oregon]

"Frank Stearns" wrote:
...Good luck with it,...
Frank
Mobile Audio


Thanks Frank and to everybody who has pitched in here. I have a deadline
now and cannot work on this problem; when I do I will report back with what
works.

Frank, I realize your business is right across the river and I have your
business number that I found on the internet. I maybe giving you a call on
this issue and maybe some future work. I am in Lake Oswego.

[Here In Oregon]

Just wanted to let you all know that the two Grace 101s in my studio sound
very good now.

Anyway, we ran *normal* balanced XLR cables from the Graces to my consoles
balanced XLR input or balanced 1/4 inch input and these channels have
channel inserts which takes the signal away from the consoles massive array
of signal chain and instead flows the signal immediately to the *very* short
unbalanced Mogami snake runs to my Apogees AD-16X.

Wire and gain I think it is called with no hum and sounds really graceful.
My former XLR cables had been wired weird and *different* at both ends which
really through me off.

Thanks to all that helped.

HIO

[Frank Stearns]

"Here In Oregon" writes:

Just wanted to let you all know that the two Grace 101s in my studio sound
very good now.

Anyway, we ran *normal* balanced XLR cables from the Graces to my consoles
balanced XLR input or balanced 1/4 inch input and these channels have
channel inserts which takes the signal away from the consoles massive array
of signal chain and instead flows the signal immediately to the *very* short
unbalanced Mogami snake runs to my Apogees AD-16X.

Wire and gain I think it is called with no hum and sounds really graceful.
My former XLR cables had been wired weird and *different* at both ends which
really through me off.


Big step in the right direction; glad you got the immediate nasty hum problem fixed.

But depending on the kind of work you do, you might not get the full breathtaking
clarity of the Grace pre amps until you can get their output - balanced - directly
into the Apogee - balanced - with no intervening console electronics or extra
wiring and connectors.

Something to try at your next wiring opportunity (which I know you love to do w):
make up a new DB25 with two balanced inputs permanently wired to XLRs that go to the
Grace outputs, with the other six Apogee input channels to a patch bay, or wherever
you normally connect them.

Related side story: One of the more stunning signal paths is the Grace M802 with the
on-board Grace A-D converters. I took a recent acoustic album project made with that
unit over to a friend who is something of a higher-end audio system nut. Lots of
custom gear; actually sounds pretty good compared to most high-end systems, which
often have some sort of affectation that's annoying.

He's a former Steinway tech from Carnegie Hall and is also a pretty good player; he
has a good ear. He was oooing and ahhhing about the sound of that album, and stared
at me in disbelief when I said we didn't have the budget for my usual mastering guy
who's really good, so the project -- recorded and mixed in Protools -- was
mastered by me with CD Architect. Once in digital it stayed in digital the entire
way and yes, I was doing "self dentistry".

I don't think we lost anything with that final mix and mastering process, and we
didn't have to "cover up" anything in mastering from the "front" part of the
recording, given the sweetness of the digital signal passed to PT by the 802.

Frank
Mobile Audio
--

[Here In Oregon]

"Frank Stearns" wrote

Big step in the right direction; glad you got the immediate nasty hum
problem fixed.

Thanks Frank.

But depending on the kind of work you do, you might not get the full
breathtaking
clarity of the Grace pre amps until you can get their output - balanced -
directly
into the Apogee - balanced - with no intervening console electronics or
extra
wiring and connectors.

Yes, I know, but I am getting really good sound out of them for now and when
I have a lull I will do what you suggest.

Something to try at your next wiring opportunity (which I know you love
to do w):
make up a new DB25 with two balanced inputs permanently wired to XLRs that
go to the
Grace outputs, with the other six Apogee input channels to a patch bay, or
wherever
you normally connect them.

You know the one thing I love about soldering is just how few tools one
needs for the operation and it surely isn't heart surgery.

Let's see, I just pull out my:

1. Cardboard for table top
2. Extension cable
3. Surge outlet strip
4. Lamp
5. Weller soldering iron
6. Holder for soldering iron
7. Solder
8. Wet sponge with multiple slits in it
9. Extra hands apparatus
10. Exhaust fan (although I think I read somewhere recently that breathing
lead actually might be good for you)
11. Long needle nose pliers
12. Short stubby needle nose pliers
13. Wire strippers
14. Magnifying glass
15. Safety glasses
16. Multiple types of heat shrink tubing
17. Heat gun
18. Large wire cutters
19. Small wire cutters
20. Shield unthreading tool
21. Box cutter knife
22. Vinyl electrical tape
23. Fluke multimeter
24. Connectors
25. Cable

It is no wonder why I love soldering and the smell is just,...just
breathtaking. Oh, and my back gets this incredible *workout* so when I am
done, I get this warm and fuzzy feeling because I feel I have been
productive while multitasking.

Related side story: One of the more stunning signal paths is the Grace
M802 with the
on-board Grace A-D converters. I took a recent acoustic album project made
with that
unit over to a friend who is something of a higher-end audio system nut.
Lots of
custom gear; actually sounds pretty good compared to most high-end systems,
which
often have some sort of affectation that's annoying.

He's a former Steinway tech from Carnegie Hall and is also a pretty good
player; he
has a good ear. He was oooing and ahhhing about the sound of that album, and
stared
at me in disbelief when I said we didn't have the budget for my usual
mastering guy
who's really good, so the project -- recorded and mixed in Protools -- was
mastered by me with CD Architect. Once in digital it stayed in digital the
entire
way and yes, I was doing "self dentistry".

I don't think we lost anything with that final mix and mastering process,
and we
didn't have to "cover up" anything in mastering from the "front" part of the
recording, given the sweetness of the digital signal passed to PT by the 802


Interesting read. Thanks again Frank for all your help.

[Mike Rivers[_2_]]

On 1/13/2013 4:49 PM, Here In Oregon wrote:

You know the one thing I love about soldering is just how few tools one
needs for the operation and it surely isn't heart surgery.

Let's see, I just pull out my:

1. Cardboard for table top
2. Extension cable
3. Surge outlet strip
4. Lamp
5. Weller soldering iron
6. Holder for soldering iron
7. Solder
8. Wet sponge with multiple slits in it
9. Extra hands apparatus
10. Exhaust fan (although I think I read somewhere recently that
breathing lead actually might be good for you)
11. Long needle nose pliers
12. Short stubby needle nose pliers
13. Wire strippers
14. Magnifying glass
15. Safety glasses
16. Multiple types of heat shrink tubing
17. Heat gun
18. Large wire cutters
19. Small wire cutters
20. Shield unthreading tool
21. Box cutter knife
22. Vinyl electrical tape
23. Fluke multimeter
24. Connectors
25. Cable

A friend of mine had a favorite expression that I use myself quite a
bit: "There's no job so small that it doesn't require every tool in the
shop."

I find that a small Jorgensen wood clamp is really handy for holding
just about any kind of connector for soldering.

http://www.traditionalwoodworker.com...uctinfo/3-105/





--
For a good time, call http://mikeriversaudio.wordpress.com

[jason]

On Sun, 13 Jan 2013 17:19:30 -0500 "Mike Rivers" wrote
in article

On 1/13/2013 4:49 PM, Here In Oregon wrote:

- snip -

A friend of mine had a favorite expression that I use myself quite a
bit: "There's no job so small that it doesn't require every tool in the
shop."

And never forget: The bigger the blob, the better the job!



I find that a small Jorgensen wood clamp is really handy for holding
just about any kind of connector for soldering.

http://www.traditionalwoodworker.com...uctinfo/3-105/