Patch Bay question

[sipleybeck]

I have a great variety of cables interconnecting just a few pieces of gear: soundcard, voice processor, microphone, cassette deck, and integrated amplifier. There’s XLR, RCA, ¼”, and 3.5mm; some are stereo, others mono. I think I need a patch bay, but I don’t know the first thing about them. Can one find a patch bay that accepts all these different connectors? What’s the solution?

[jake-owa]

The solution is to ....use the search function...no...I'm sorry, that would help but...

Just make cables to the patchbay that fit up with the gear you have. Then it's just a matter of patch cables to connect gear. It all depends on what type of Pbay you buy. Some have solder blocks in back some have RCA in back.

[sipleybeck]

jake-owa,

By "make cables" do you mean, buy the cable and the connectors, and solder them together? I'm not auditioning for Mr. Obvious - I just have NO confidence when it comes to soldering stuff. I'm afraid a poor soldering job might introduce noise into the circuits.

What kind of patch bay works best for you?

[TexRoadkill]

Patchbays either have one type of jack on the back (these are the cheap ones and usually use 1/4' or RCA) or they have no connectors on the back and you need to solder or punchblock all the cables into it.

If you are not into soldering or making cables then you will need to have somebody do it for you and that is not cheap. Here's a good place to get you started - Mr Patchbay http://www.flash.net/~motodata/patchbays/cables.html

[SonicAlbert]

Most likely what you'll want to do is get a standard 1/4" patchbay, which are pretty inexpensive. The kind with 1/4" connectors front and back. Then you'll need to buy the various kinds of connector cables, like XLR to TRS, TRS to TS, RCA to TRS, etc. some of those you may need to have custom built if they are not available ready made at the store.

Also, make sure you get a balanced patchbay, not the unbalanced kind. Some will advertise being able to handle both balanced and unbalanced connections, that's what you want.

The key is to have the right kind of cable for the various connections. If you have the cabling done correctly the audio should be pristine, no matter what's being connected to what.

[jake-owa]

Yes, learn to make custom length cables...please don't be another home recorder who can't make a few cables.

It goes against everything I stand for.
Engineer your studio to your needs and it will be a great place for you to record.

[sipleybeck]

I found a very good article on patchbays in a March 2002 copy of HomeRecording. After reading through it twice I understand most of what it says, but I don’t know which would be best for my particular application - though I do like the idea of switches to change between normaled, half-normaled, and non-normaled.

I believe the model shown in the article is a HOSA PHB265, but I haven’t researched it on-line to be sure. Is $179 about what one would expect to pay for a patch bay that won’t introduce unwanted noise into the equation?

I do think I would like to learn to make my own cables. Can someone direct me to information on the subject? jake-owa?