The effects of cabling on sound quality.

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-- The effects of cabling on sound quality.

Posted by vhx1 on May-17-2004 20:05:

The effects of cabling on sound quality.

I have always wondered.. How much of an effect are my RCA cables and my RCA to stereo miniplug converter cables are going to have on the sound quality that will be recorded by my computer? Is it worth it to drop a few bucks into higher quality RCA cables?

Posted by dj chex on May-17-2004 20:13:

That can be hard to say. At times i do experience a higher s/n ratio w/ better cables for recording, while other times i don't see any difference. I would personally use better cables for recording b/c they do help imo.

As for speaker cables, Alex Rosner said there's no advantage between expensive and cheap.

Alex Rosner at Red Bull Music Academy

quote:

A good looking loudspeaker helps! If you have a good looking loudspeaker versus a lousy looking loudspeaker, and they both sound identical, I promise you that you will choose the good looking one. I found speaker wire cable, that costs 60 dollars per foot. They sell it so expensive, because it looks so pretty. But I promise you, if I take a lamp cord, that cost 20 cents per foot, you would not hear a difference.�

Posted by vhx1 on May-17-2004 23:30:

What about like RCA cables you could find at radio shack vs higher quality monster cable

Posted by SUNWmsf on May-17-2004 23:32:

if you are running an un-balanced system, (RCA is an example of un-balanced connections), then the shorter the cable the better. If you run long un-balanced cables, you will get noise. (you may even pick up radio wave noise if the cables are long enough...)

If you run a balanced system, the length of the cable is not that important.

For recording, my opinion is to go balanced.

Posted by dj chex on May-18-2004 00:29:

so true. As for radioshack vs monster, if your only gonna need a short distance like 3-6ft, than radioshack should be fine. But for long distance like 15+ft i would go for the better of the two. BTW, i do use a couple of radioshack "gold series" cables for traktor and my extigy, and they do get the job done fine. As for recording, i use monster "interlink 200 rca-rca" which are called "balanced" but really are not balanced. They work pretty well for rejecting rf noise.

If in the future you get a pc soundcard for recording, be sure it has balanced inputs like xlr or trs, instead of rca or the more common 1/8" stereo mini jack.

Posted by vhx1 on May-18-2004 01:32:

AH ic thanks for the info. DOes the M-Audio Audiophile 24/96 support these inputs?

Posted by dj chex on May-18-2004 03:12:

The m-audio audiophile 24/96 doesn't support balanced inputs. Still, it's a very clean sounding rca inputs and way better than any soundblaster sound card for recording.

Posted by DJTJ on May-18-2004 09:25:

Yeah, I would have to say that the soundcard is more important than the cabling when recording to a PC. A Soundblaster (yes, even the audigy) just will not really cut it for pro-sounding recording. You need something decent like the M-Audio, or the Hoontech ST Audio DSP24V which is much cheaper than the M-Audio but uses the same chipset.

Posted by dj chex on May-18-2004 09:45:

also for ~$50 more than the audiophile, you can get the m-audio delta 44. That support balanced TRS inputs.