TS Lead vs. Guitar Lead

philbagg

philbagg

Just Killing Time
What's the difference? :confused:

I usually plug my guitar into my MBox 2 with a guitar lead for Guitar Rig, and it works fine. I leave my amp at the bands rehearsal spot so I use this at home for practice.

Today I left my guitar lead in the singers car, so I just grabbed a TS lead that I use for hooking up my monitors to my MBox 2 (which works fine), and I'm getting a lot of noise, like it's not fully pushed in or something. It still recieves signal, but the noise is quite overpowering.

(This happened the other day too, and I've sinced used the guitar lead which worked fine so it's not the guitar or interface)

I thought guitar cables were just TS cables? :confused:
 
A guitar cable is just a TS cable.

What makes a guitar cable different from speaker TS cables is the gauge of the wire used in the cable. Guitar cables with typically be around 20 or 18 gauge. Speaker cable gauge will typically be around 16 to 12 gauge, and the gauge used in speaker cable is generally determined by the length of the cable.
i.e. the longer the cable the lower the gauge.

TS is just a term to describe the tip that's used on the cable (T = tip, S= Sleeve, and for cables that are TRS R = Ring)
 
Because of the inductance and high output impedance of pickup coils, instrument cables (on account of their capacitance) have strong potential to influence the sound.

Generally, you would want an instrument cables need to have as low capacitance as possible, and/or be as short as possible. Just remember that the longer the cable, the greater the capacitance.

The above is not necessarily a problem or a fault, however, so you just need to consider your cable as part of your instrument.

This short article might be helpful: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/nov09/articles/guitarcables.htm

Quality cables need not be expensive to buy or make. Beware of "audiophile" cables which are invariably expensive and claim benefits that can usually not be independently and repeatably verified.

Paul
 
Last edited:
mixsit said:
Just curious then, did it turn out to be a speaker cable or just a bad one?
Click to expand...

The speaker cables are fine, the guitar's fine, the interface is fine. I think it was just using a speaker cable with a guitar that proved to be a bad match. It also might have something to do with the "high gain" pickups on the Ibanez, but I don't really have a clue :confused:
 
philbagg said:
The speaker cables are fine, the guitar's fine, the interface is fine. I think it was just using a speaker cable with a guitar that proved to be a bad match. It also might have something to do with the "high gain" pickups on the Ibanez, but I don't really have a clue :confused:
Click to expand...

Tadpui said:
Plus speaker cables aren't shielded like instrument cables are.
Click to expand...
..Like he said. Speaker cables are fine, but not as guitar leads.
It wasn't clear from the first post 'cause said 'monitor cable' could have been a speaker cable, or shielded (for a powered monitor).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top