I have a problem. I am handicap when it comes to balanced vs
unbalanced. I really don't understand where to use one or the other.
I want to connect all my pre's into my card with an 8 channel 1/4" to
1/4" snake. I have an RNP, PRO MPA, and have 4 Old School Audio pres
on the way. I am buying a snake but don't know if I should get
balanced or unbalanced. I am going to start puttimg them into a
(balanced) patchbay in a couple months. Also will unbalanced cables
always work for things like this? Will balanced cables always work
for things like this? Anyway, any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

Dudleys100 wrote:
I have a problem. I am handicap when it comes to balanced vs
unbalanced. I really don't understand where to use one or the other.
I want to connect all my pre's into my card with an 8 channel 1/4" to
1/4" snake. I have an RNP, PRO MPA, and have 4 Old School Audio
pres on the way. I am buying a snake but don't know if I should get
balanced or unbalanced. I am going to start puttimg them into a
(balanced) patchbay in a couple months. Also will unbalanced cables
always work for things like this? Will balanced cables always work
for things like this? Anyway, any help would be appreciated. Thanks.


Besides the problem of balanced vs unbalanced wirings there are
problems of the studio level at + 4dBu and domestic level at - 10 dBV.
The impedances of the sources of studio equipment will be 50 ohms,
but domestic gear will be arround 600 ohms.
A balanced cable often looks only like a balanced cable but more
important is how is the source and how is it connected. A XLR plug
does not guarantee a balanced connection.
The only thing is su 1/4" phone plugs will be unbalanced.

Start reading he
http://www.wpi.edu/Academics/Depts/H...bal-unbal.html
http://www.audiomidi.com/classroom/general/cables.cfm
http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/m.../article.jhtml
http://www.sudeepaudio.com/lessons/technical/cables.htm
http://www.akg.com/akg_structuretree...uage,E N.html
http://www.jensen-transformers.com/an/an003.pdf
http://www.proformance.net/support/_disc1/00000001.htm
http://www.ews64.com/mccableconnect.html
http://www.makehits.co.uk/qanda5.htm
http://terrasonde.newmediaone.net/02/cable_tester.htm
http://www.trinitysoundcompany.com/wire-up.html
http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/m...le.jhtml?term=
http://www.recordingeq.com/EQ/req0400/cords.htm

Cheers

Eberhard Sengpiel

On Mon, 8 Dec 2003 10:28:47 +0100, "Eberhard Sengpiel"
wrote:


The only thing is su 1/4" phone plugs will be unbalanced.

Of course, you mean RCA plugs are always unbalanced, and 1/4" TS plugs are
always unbalanced. Cables with 1/4" TRS plugs may be balanced.

"Dudleys100" wrote in message
om
I have a problem. I am handicap when it comes to balanced vs
unbalanced. I really don't understand where to use one or the other.
I want to connect all my pre's into my card with an 8 channel 1/4" to
1/4" snake. I have an RNP, PRO MPA, and have 4 Old School Audio pres
on the way. I am buying a snake but don't know if I should get
balanced or unbalanced. I am going to start putting them into a
(balanced) patchbay in a couple months. Also will unbalanced cables
always work for things like this? Will balanced cables always work
for things like this? Anyway, any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

In general, anything that is balanced can be easily "dumbed down" to accept
an unbalanced piece of gear and fully exploit it. The converse is not true.
IME most of the *cost* of balanced cables, etc is the inconvenience of
finding them, because one I find them, they generally don't cost that much
more. While my local *Guitar Barn* doesn't have every kind of balanced cable
that I might want, my workbench and serious retailers like Markertek seem
to be able to step up to the challenge.

In article writes:

I have a problem. I am handicap when it comes to balanced vs
unbalanced.

I have a problem, too. I have written a few magazine articles about
the subject which would answer all of your questions, but I don't have
a good way to get you to find them or read them. Any suggestions?

I really don't understand where to use one or the other.

Use balanced cables and patchbay jacks to connect balanced equipment.
You can also use then to connect unbalanced equipment. There are a
number of schemes for connecting between balanced and unbalanced
equipment.

I want to connect all my pre's into my card with an 8 channel 1/4" to
1/4" snake. I have an RNP, PRO MPA, and have 4 Old School Audio pres
on the way. I am buying a snake but don't know if I should get
balanced or unbalanced. I am going to start puttimg them into a
(balanced) patchbay in a couple months.

Balanced. It doesn't cost significantly more, and if you buy
unbalanced, you won't get the best performance if you add something
with balanced outputs or inputs to your system. I believe that all of
your present stuff has balanced outputs, so there should be no
question.

Also will unbalanced cables
always work for things like this? Will balanced cables always work
for things like this? Anyway, any help would be appreciated.

You can make anything work in just about every case, but you need to
understand the wiring. There are a couple of good application notes on
the Rane web site that will help you. Read 'em before you buy any
cables.



--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me he double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

"Dudleys100" wrote in message
om...
I have a problem. I am handicap when it comes to balanced vs
unbalanced. I really don't understand where to use one or the other.
I want to connect all my pre's into my card with an 8 channel 1/4" to
1/4" snake. I have an RNP, PRO MPA, and have 4 Old School Audio pres
on the way. I am buying a snake but don't know if I should get
balanced or unbalanced. I am going to start puttimg them into a
(balanced) patchbay in a couple months. Also will unbalanced cables
always work for things like this? Will balanced cables always work
for things like this? Anyway, any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

Well, first, you need to figure out if the sound cards i/o is balanced or
unbalanced.

Also, depending on what you buy, the price difference between an unbalanced
snake and a balanced snake is minimal, and the snake may have a longer
useful life than your current soundcard. If your soundcard is unbalanced,
you can buy the balanced snake now and somewhere down the line it will most
likely be more useful to you.

Now, the balanced patchbay won't do any good if you don't have balanced
snakes and a balanced soundcard. Any cables will work to move audio around,
but a balanced snake is a useful thing to own if you ever have any problems
with certain types of noise.

jb

Thanks for the info everyone, that was great. I am just starting to
read through all those links (which are very informative) how did you
find the time to get all those? Thanks. And Mike I appreciate the
words. I have the last year of home recording, tape op, and recording
magazine. Let me know what issues and mags you have done the articels
in and I can get searchin. One problem I noticed which made me
question using balanced cables with unbalanced equipment was with my
RNC. For a test I put a balanced cable into one side and an
unbalanced into the other and the levels were different on output. I
will probably find an answer to this as I read, but if anyone has some
explanations and or workarounds if I get balanced cables it would be
appreciated. Thanks. Ken

In article writes:

I have the last year of home recording, tape op, and recording
magazine. Let me know what issues and mags you have done the articels
in and I can get searchin.

Start with July 1996. I had an article every month through October
2000. September 1996, January 1997, July 1997, May 1998 and July 1999
might be of particular interest on the general subject of balanced vs.
unbalanced interfaces. You'll have to order those as back issues from
the web site unless you can find someone or a library that has them.

One problem I noticed which made me
question using balanced cables with unbalanced equipment was with my
RNC. For a test I put a balanced cable into one side and an
unbalanced into the other and the levels were different on output.

The RNC is a bad test case. It's unbalanced even though it uses TRS
jacks. The output jack has no connection to the ring contact (so it
won't work into a balanced input if you plug in a TRS plug). To
further complicate things, the input TRS jack is really an input and
an output. The input signal is between the tip and sleeve, and if you
don't have anything plugged into the output jack, you get the output
signal between the ring and sleeve. This arrangement lets you connect
it to an unbalanced insert jack that has the conventional wiring and
insert the RNC into a mixer's channel path with a single TRS cable.



--
I'm really Mike Rivers - )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me he double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo

Cool, so basically if I get an 8 channel balanced snake and run my
pres into my RME then that will work fine, and then I can use
unbalanced patch cables to link up my RNC through the patch bay and be
fine? If so then I can order my cables (as I still filter through all
the articles I have bookmarked to learn more). Actually would I be ok
to get all unbalanced patch cables so I don't have to worry about
which ones I am sticking into the RNC or will the multiple types of
cables cause problems? Thanks a lot. Ken

In article writes:

if I get an 8 channel balanced snake and run my
pres into my RME then that will work fine, and then I can use
unbalanced patch cables to link up my RNC through the patch bay and be
fine?

As long as your patchbay has balanced (two-conductor) jacks, using
unbalanced patch cables from jack to jack will make the proper
connections when going from a balanced source to an unbalanced
destination, or vice versa.

If you have a source which is differential as well as balanced,
connecting it to an unbalanced input with a balanced patch cable won't
work since you don't have a "return" path for the signal. Draw out a
diagram and you'll see why.

Actually would I be ok
to get all unbalanced patch cables so I don't have to worry about
which ones I am sticking into the RNC or will the multiple types of
cables cause problems?

That will always work, but you'll always lose the benefit of a
balanced connection. This may or may not make a difference in your
setup and at your working level. But do get a balanced patchbay and
balanced snakes. Those are your biggest chunks of money and will be
expensive to replace should you need to do so in the future. Short
patch cables are cheap.




--
I'm really Mike Rivers )
However, until the spam goes away or Hell freezes over,
lots of IP addresses are blocked from this system. If
you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring
and reach me he double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo