Need your advice on putting a TRS Patch in my studio

[acappa]

Hey folks! I´d like to hear what you guys can recomend me in order to have my hardware/cables tidier, cause now I look to the back of my table and start feeling sick!

From upper to down:
- Furman
- Behringer Phone Amp
- Neve ST EQ
- SSL MBus clone
- Distressor
- 2x Chandler Germanium
- Saffire 56
- SSL Alpha converter

- Furman
- API 3124
- SSL Xlogic pres
- Audient ASP008

The fact is that I´m bored of having to move the table to access the back side, then contorsionist posture, to patch the distressor to one or another pre, the neve to two pres, and so on!!!
Signal path is: Mic -> XLR patch -> pre IN -> pre OUT -> Coverter In -> Adat out -> Saffire

Ins and outs on alpha link are DSub25 and I have 6 snakes with XLR male/female and TRS, so in your opinion/experience, which way I have to connect everything!

 

[Jarkko Mattheiszen]

I'd get TRS (or if you can afford it, go Bantam) patches and cut-to-measure cables. Half-normalled (or normalled depending on your needs) from the mic preamps to the converters, outboard separately.

 

[greyskull]

A decent TRS bay is just great. Unless you have a LFAC I REALLY don't see the point in Batam/TT patchbays.

 

[acappa]

Yep, I´d go for a nice TRS patch bay, but what´s not clear in my mind, is how to patch everything....¯\(°_o)/¯ patch bays hahaha

 

[Jarkko Mattheiszen]

A decent TRS bay is just great. Unless you have a LFAC I REALLY don't see the point in Batam/TT patchbays.

Bantam patch bays generally have more reliable contacts. I've spent many fabulous moments trying to get Neutrik TRS patchbays working properly, rapidly plugging patch cables in and out and hunting down issues in the signal path. I'm not saying TRS patchbays are crap, but they usually do wear with use.

Yep, I´d go for a nice TRS patch bay, but what´s not clear in my mind, is how to patch everything....¯(°_o)/¯ patch bays hahaha

In your case, here's one example:

1st unit top row 1-16: Outputs from the live room
1st unit bottom row 1-16: Preamp inputs
Normal, so the signal will flow from each upper jack to each lower jack UNLESS there's a patch cable plugged in if you want to use a different mic channel for a different preamp.

2nd unit top row 1-16: Preamp outputs
2nd unit bottom row 1-16: Converter inputs
Normal, so the signal will flow from each upper jack to each lower jack UNLESS there's a patch cable plugged in if you want to use a different preamp out for a different converter channel or if you want to patch an outboard unit between the preamp and conversion.

If you get 48-point patchbays, you still have eight channels left for your seven channels of outboard, so you could hook those up like this:

1st unit top row 17-24: Converter outputs
1st unit bottom row 17-24 (well, 17-23): Outboard inputs
Whether you want to normal these channels is pretty much up to you.

2nd unit top row 17-24 (17-23): Outboard outputs
2nd unit bottom row 17-24: Converter inputs
Again, normalling is up to you.

Sorry if I'm making little sense or not thinking clearly, I way overslept and I'm quite hazy still

 

[Jarkko Mattheiszen]

To clarify the example, you could use it like this:
Plug a mic in the live room to channel 1. If you don't insert any patch cables, the mic will go into the preamp designated to channel 1 in patch, and from the preamp it'll go into the converter input 1.
If you want to use a different preamp, plug a patch cable between 1st unit top row jack 1 and the respective preamp on the bottom row, let's say 3. If you keep it like this, the signal will still continue from the preamp to converter input 3. If you want to assign it back to input 1, plug a patch cable between 2nd unit top row jack 3 and bottom row jack 1.
If you want to use outboard in the recording, place a patch cable between the respective preamp out jack and, say, jack 17 on the 1st unit's bottom row. Then you can patch the signal from that outboard unit back to whichever converter input you want.

And ALWAYS LABEL EVERYTHING!

 

[sprack]

I have 2 of these. I run them between the 2 racks with an 8-channel snake. It's handy having a switch for half/normal/thru.

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/SPatchPlus/

 

[amarshism]

Off topic but how do you find the vhd pres. They just went on half price sale near me.