Home studio Cables

[under_rump]

hey all, first post so better say hi

i was directed here by a friend of mine and told this forum was "kickass" lol


anyway i was wondering if some of the signal veterans out there could help me with my cable queries. I have bought 60 metres of balanced applicable audio cable as well as a bunch of NYS228G jack connectors and a mixture of male and female nc3xxx connectors.

first question is, are the stereo jack plugs i have just bought usable for balanced mono wiring?

second question is, i have heard alot about nuetrik's jack plug tip connector being the middle tab rather than the inner tab, is this true?

finally, how is everyone doing

cheers

 

[under_rump]

any takers?

 

[Norris-wf]

http://www.mediacollege.com/audio/connection/xlr-jack-stereo.html
If thats what you are trying to do then this should help. Best advice, use a multimeter and trace the connections. One probe on middle tab, second on tip then that'll tell you straight off. If you are making your own cables, a multimeter is always useful for checking your work. If the Balanced mono cable has the three wires then it'll work with the stero Jacks as per that diagram

 

[arv_foh]

1. yes

2. I'm not sure, wire one up and find out, there should be schematics for the connectors, but I really don't know why they would be any different.. make a cable, plug it in halfway, and if you don't get any signal you know the tip is not wired correctly

 

[under_rump]

kewl the only thing is i tried hot on the middle tab and cold on the inner tab and vice versa and still got the same signall which is worrying me :s

also i am still getting interference, less than before but not impressivley, any ideas?

 

[Norris-wf]

Do you have pictures of what you are doing? It may help....

 

[under_rump]

Sorry bro i have know camera, i have a temperary setup downstairs in the dining room at the minute because the studio is upstairs being finished off and everything down here is like 1 foot away from each other i.e. computer, monitors screen annd interface all squashed next to each other which i hope is the problem. oh, noticed you from durham man, me too, over bishop auckland/weardale area

anyway thanks for the help so far guys, not much more we can do until everything is setup properly upstairs yet.

ill report back if any other problems but thanks to all

 

[under_rump]

Alright.

Got the cables working fine and they are all wired correctly. but i still had interference in my monitors (yamaha HS80's)

after pluging and unpluging every connection i had it turns out the noise is coming via the firewire cable to the interface (profire 2626) and was only there when the cable was pluged in.

Has anyone got any ideas what is causing this? i am going nuts

 

[arv_foh]

is all your gear plugged into a power conditioner?

 

[under_rump]

no currently an extension from mains

 

[Norris-wf]

I had noise on my old connection too, Try a different fw port
I moved my setup since and the interference went, even on the old port!

 

[under_rump]

damn this is really bugging me, i have a gtx 295 graphics card as well which will be contributing to the noise but why in the first place is the noise getting to the interface and speakers?

 

[under_rump]

would it be worth getting a power conditioner anyway? this is what i have now to go in the studio i am not using it right now

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Rack-mount-19..._Consumer_Professional_RL?hash=item27a5a13562

 

[arv_foh]

would it be worth getting a power conditioner anyway? this is what i have now to go in the studio i am not using it right now

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Rack-mount-19..._Consumer_Professional_RL?hash=item27a5a13562

I don't think that's actually a power conditioner, it looks just like a rackmount power stick. I'd get a Furman

I've found that just having even 1 piece of gear plugged into dirty power (I had one monitor plugged into my wall, and it passed a ground buzz down through the XLR into my sub) can have all sorts of issues with line noise and interference.

 

[under_rump]

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/4812114-post4.html

this is a perfect example of the problem i have, guy happens to have the same speakers as well

 

[under_rump]

would dirty power cause interferance from cpu etc. down to the speakers?

Also i am new to power conditioners could you give me some advice on picking the right one? and do i need more than one?

i would have a maximum of of 20 peices of kit in the rack and also need to power 2 referance monitors, 1 computer monitor, the computer itself and probably a few other things like printer and stuff.

thanks for the help so far

 

[under_rump]

bump

 

[Norris-wf]

I would first check all my calbes. As I said, I had this problem a while back, exact same noise, then chaned port and it went. Although, now I changed everything around, the sound is gone and I'm usinig the original port. Try and keep audio cables away from power and data cables if possible, or else run them perpendicular to the cables. It doesnt really sound like a power issue as its not a constant 50/60 Hz hum (I could be wrong) but more picking up signal from the computer. try moving the computer further away perhaps and feeding and cables to and from it as far away as audio cables as possible. At least that wont cost anything to try it out!

 

[under_rump]

Yeah i think that will be a good idea, unfortunatly wont have time till later in the week and i will hunt down on everything and place everything in a different area.

i still think that a power conditioner is a must as the electricity in this house isnt brilliant and the wiring is very very old. would i be able to just have one power conditioner and connect the power distribution units (back up in the post) to the conditioner?

 

[under_rump]

F*** Yes!!!

i finally removed the cpu noises that were coming through the monitors, turns out it was the built in energy saver (c1e) needed to be disabled in the bios menu


thanks for everyone's help

and sorry bout the excitement...