Registered: Jul 2003
Location: near Vancouver, Canada
expensive interconnect cables - worth it?
Has anyone tried any interconnect cables in their DJ setup that are more expensive than the standard ones that came with your equipment?
I was trying to get best sound quality I could get and I was curious to see if expensive cables made a difference. So I upgraded one of my important RCA cables to a THX grade cable by Monster. This is one of the cheaper varieties of Monster cable, it uses shielded twisted pair conductors instead of a normal thin coax cable.
I couldn't hear any difference at all in the sound quality.
as stated above its as good as the weakest link, although ive used many different cables in my profession and have done tests the noticable difference is very minimal in short distances, long runs is where the best cables makes a huge difference.
Jul-06-2005 06:59
dj chex
A monkey without a cause
Registered: Mar 2004
Location: denver co
exactly. Also, if your suffering ground loop issues, you may want to connect things like mixers amps on different power circuits and or consider getting something like a power conditioner. Another thing, the more equipment you have, the more difficult it is to have everything working it's best. (at least from my experience)
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quote:
Make it idiot proof and someone will make a better idiot.
He who laughs last thinks slowest!
Jul-06-2005 07:34
Psiweaver
I DJ 120,000 Massives
Registered: Jul 2003
Location: Culver City United States
depends on how nice the system your running it to is.
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Jul-06-2005 11:04
Zild
Ten City
Registered: Jun 2004
Location: San Antonio, US : TXTA #156
Long story short, monster cables are a huge waste of money.
___________________
I've never been able to eat a whole baby.
Kill the women. Eat the children.
It's just one of those days where you want to bend over everyone you know and kiss their ass goodbye with a big sideways boot.
monster is a huge joke. they dont make anything special except hype. I can make better cables, for less, myself.
Jul-06-2005 15:38
Zild
Ten City
Registered: Jun 2004
Location: San Antonio, US : TXTA #156
quote:
Originally posted by MERiDiAN5i2
monster is a huge joke. they dont make anything special except hype. I can make better cables, for less, myself.
He's right.
___________________
I've never been able to eat a whole baby.
Kill the women. Eat the children.
It's just one of those days where you want to bend over everyone you know and kiss their ass goodbye with a big sideways boot.
Registered: Jul 2003
Location: near Vancouver, Canada
You can see how Monster designs their stuff to suck in people. They use thick cable insulation and big connectors because people think bigger is better. But size has nothing to do with sound quality, in fact a heavy stiff cable with big connectors is more likely to cause problems twisting the jacks on your gear and coming disconnected.
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Well I might try making some cables but gathering the parts is some work. The best interconnects use silver wire and a teflon tube to act as insulator and as for connectors there's a huge range of prices and none of this stuff can be found locally. But there are some web places that specialize in these parts and have it all. Pretty good interconnects can be made from Belden 89259 coax.
I made some speaker cables from braided twisted-pair wires from CAT-55 network cable and they improved the sound a little, better highs. But the cables are stiff and cannot be made too long, probably 10 feet max, because they have a fair bit of capacitance.
Jul-06-2005 17:52
tamtui
Senior tranceaddict
Registered: Jul 2002
Location: Washington, D.C. USA
best interconnect in my opinion....
is to build your own.
Always get industrial grade stuff. Here at the studio we work at, we always make our own cables. Even RCA's we make them out of coax cable and get RCA adapters for the ends. They are superstrong and super durable. Also very cheap and higher quality.
I wouldn't buy cables from a home electronic store. Or anything for my DJ set up there. Ultimately though it does depend on how long the run is and how many pieces of equipment you have. On a small setup it's not too critical.
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ok sig police please don't hurt me...
Jul-07-2005 14:13
Freak
Insert witty comment here
Registered: Jul 2003
Location: On a plane probably...
In a professional recording studio or a top club- yes
At home? No
Jul-07-2005 14:56
MERiDiAN5i2
Supreme tranceaddict
Registered: Oct 2001
Location: Texas, USA
Re: best interconnect in my opinion....
quote:
Originally posted by tamtui
Always get industrial grade stuff.
soooo true. personally I tend to stick with neutrik connectors and canare star-quad cable. I'm really a fan of the starquad cable... it has a very nice shield, is available in "thick" and "thin" sizes, has a tough jacket and doesnt cost much. It also comes in a selection of fairly tasteful colors which not only make cable identification easier, but look cool too...
As far as sources, the two I tend to recommend are MarkerTek.com and PartsExpress.com. I've made a number of orders with each and had good luck. Of course there are other places, but figured I'd share my two favs.
quote:
Here at the studio we work at, we always make our own cables. Even RCA's we make them out of coax cable and get RCA adapters for the ends.
neat idea! what sort of coax and connector? Im guessing RG58 with BNC ends?
best interconnect in my opinion....
