A cord question

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brendandwyer

brendandwyer

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I'd like to solder up a splitter cable with xlr ends.

Does this make sense. Will it work. The idea is to put up an xy pair, connect the two mono xlr's and then connect the single end of the splitter into the 'ol preamp so that i'm not mixing the two sources to together, but rather combining them pre-preamp.

Yes no? Maybe? So.........
 
You're essentially mixing them down to a mono source. If you're doing a stereo pair, don't you want to make a stereo recording? Yes you have two microphones, but you're only recording a mono track. It's not really a stereo recording.
 
originally i thought the same thing, however in this post https://homerecording.com/bbs/showpost.php?p=2041769&postcount=16

both farview and glen explained that two of the same thing is still mono, soooo, why bother effecting the two different, just take two mics (sources) and amplify them equally. Maybe i'm missing a finer point of what they said, but it seems like an interesting thing to try.
 
Using an xy pair is creating a stereo recording. If you are recording a singular source the image will not be as wide as say recording an orchestra. However, the image is still there. It will help you to hear an image based on point source relations, as well reflections of your space. If it were just the speaker on a guitar cab I would wonder what kind of image you would really get. The farther back you go, the more different it would be. If this happens to be drums, there will be a distinct image. If it's acoustic guitar, there will be a little less than drums, but still a definitive image.

Personally, I do not like loading up two mics on one cable (impedence and loading issues etc...). Will it work? yes. Could it damage something? I do not know for certain, but I would imagine so.
 
If you only use 1 input, it's a mono recording, no matter how many mics you use. Yes, you may cover more of the stage, but it's not a stereo recording with 1 track. You're folding everything down to 1 input. (Even if you record 1 input to a stereo track, it's just dual mono).

Stereo microphones have special cables to go from the mic to 2 XLR cables, because each side needs it's own input/track to be a stereo recording.

Look at it this way, say you close mic a kit with a handful of mics with their own little mixer. You then send a single output of that mixer to your recording device. It's a mono recording. If you send L/R Outputs of the kit mixer to two inputs of your recording device, that's a stereo recording.
 
the question wasn't how to create a stereo recording. It is more along the lines of "as a way to create an effect of two mics reduced to one channel, could you end up with a usable effect. Say one mic over the drum set, one mic 15' away, both reduced to one track with the cable.
 
Sorry for the second post but I just read the link to referred to. Talking about close micing a guitar amp and doing a stereo recording are two different animals. In the post you referenced, they were saying that even though the guy used two amps, it was the same information in each amp, so it's really dual mono. True stereo is 2 input sources (microphones)/2 output sources (speakers)

There's no reason to put close mic a stereo pair on a guitar cab for example. (putting two different mics on a cab is a different story of course). If you wanted to put up stereo pair in a room and mic a guitar amp that way you could I suppose.

I guess my next question is what specifically are you trying to record?
Just rememer (sorry to harp on this point), unless you have two inputs, it's not really stereo
 
Oh, well that's totally different. In your first post you were talking about doing an XY pair, so I assumed you were talking more about micing a choir or something like that, rather than close micing.

So you don't actually want a stereo pair, you just want two mics on one input.

Why mix in a cable I guess is my question? If you want a room mic and drum mic on the same track, why not just mix them that way post mic-pre, that way you actually have some control. Is it a problem of inputs?

As for creating a cable, you can probably do it, but I don't really have insight into how well it would/wouldn't work.
 
it's more of an idea than something to solve a problem. I don't have input constraints or anything like that. I wanted to wire a cable to experiment with this. I'm basically looking for guidance on wiring the cable and whether or not a run the risk of damaging components. I don't have a problem to solve, but i do appreciate the attempt!

In retrospect, i should not have called it xy.
 
As a point of reference, so far I can not think of a single reason you should do this excpet for the lack of inputs, which you say you do not have. Even then, i would jsut use one mic instead. I can howev er think of a lot of reasons why you should not do this. Lets use the drums example. What if after you record it you do not like the balance? In fact, with the method you are asking about, you can not set the balance even before you record it save using pads on individual mics. Also, what if there are phase issues? You no longer will have the ability to just mute one or even attempt to fix it.
 
In that case, I suppose I might be concerned with overloading the mic pre. Maybe this is a silly concern, but it seems like something you would have to pay attention to since you obviously can't control either of the two mics individually.

Also, what if you decide you want a little more from your room mic, for example?

Sorry this thread got so far off what you were originally thinking about. Since XY is a specific mic setup I just assumed you wanted an actual stereo recording.
 
fair 'nuff. The reason i would do it is to see what i would end up with. We 're experimental in nature at our studio so it's sort of like, a fun thing to try to see what would happen. Like putting one mic on the drums and one mic in my car in the driveway. Reasons not to do it: numerous...reasons to do it: unknown, that's why we'd do it.

As long as there is no risk of damage provided it is wired correctly... soooooo....how would it be wired.

I completely understand the issues of phase, and the inability to balance the two mics, BUT those are not good enough reasons to NOT try something different. That being said, i need some guidelines on wiring it. Unless it's inherently dangerous, i'm going to do it anyway so if you guys have the wiring scheme and want to provide it, that would be great.

xstatic, you say what if i don't like the balance? It's all good, i wouldn't use the track. It's an attempt at discovering an effect i didn't have before. I just want to know the technical info to actually wire it correctly.


That's all...no more...no less
 
rak, you're definately right, i mentioned the xy pair, and it's my bad for changing focus. But the more reasons you guys gave to not try the more ways i 've thought of that i want to try it. That's why i've mentioned other applications.
 
I'm all for the spirit of experimentation, and if you do it, I'd be interested to see how it came out, but my prediction is that it won't yield anything different.

Honestly, with this new wiring technique, or with just having the two mics plugged in seperately, I can think of no reason it should change the sound, unless the wiring is bad, then you'd notice a difference of course. In that sense, it doesn't seem experimental to me.

I'm willing to be wrong on this, but you have you ask yourself, what makes the sound different by doing this? I can't come up with any answer.
 
BTW, You can buy a 2 Female --->1 Male XLR Y-cable. Probably radio shack has one.
 
of course i can't answer that, which is why i'd like to try...

Here's the point. I've got jack shit to do tomorrow so the only thing i'd waste is time.
 
It generally seems like a bad idea, but as long as you're just doing it with two ordinary mics into a mic preamp, I don't think you're likely to destory anything.

Edit: Phantom power? That could possibly kill stuff, at least if you don't wire it all properly.

"Y"ing two outputs into one input is usually bad practice. It strikes me as more so in the case of microphones. Consider that microphones (some of them anyway) put out a fragile little signal that's highly sensitive to the load (input impedance) of the preamp it's connected to. Now, suddenly, each microphone's output is connected not only to a preamp, but to another microphone.* I suspect the impedance of the microphone is lower than the preamp, so you dramatically drop the impedance the microphone sees. You may wind up with more current flowing back and forth between the mics than into the preamp.

Mixing two microphone signals together is what mixers are for. I think there are some simpler boxes which do nothing but combine multiple mics into a single signal, which are used in broadcasting.

A general extrapolation:

Y-cables are good for connecting one line-level output to two line-level inputs, at least assuming you're using ordinary, modern equipment. Input impedances of ordinary, modern audio gear are orders of magnitude higher than output impedances, so one output can easily feed more than one input.

Y-cables are not so good for connecting two outputs into one input. Depending on the gear, and your expectations, you might accomplish something you deem worthwhile by doing so, but it's not a great idea.

Y-cables call for great hesitation when connecting anything other than regular line-level audio. Using a Y-cable to connect an amplifier out to multiple speakers, for example, is a really bad idea, and might spell the end of the amplifier in some cases. At the risk of stating the obvious, don't even try to make MIDI Y-cables. While connecting two microphones together (as you've proposed) isn't likely to blow anything up, do not get the urge to Y-together a microphone and the output of something else (like, say, a power amplifier).

_________
*A side point: as many people know, you can use a speaker as a microphone (not a very good microphone, though supposedly some people use them for bass drums). What you're kind of doing here is using each microphone as speaker (a really bad speaker, particularly since you're not giving at much of a signal).
 
Pin 1 of the male xlr wires directly to pin one of both of the female connectors. The same goes for pins 2 and 3.

I undertand wanting to experiment. What I do not understand is this specific experiment. There is a possibility that you will damage something, yet the yielded result in my opinion will be worthless. The same experiment as far as mulitple mics and placements can be done with 2 preamps (which you have said that you have) but would offer a result that would be flexible and may actually turn into something useful.

Like I said, experimentation is a good thing, but typically only if the positives outweigh the negatives. In this specific example, I see several possible negatives and no real positives:(
 
cool. that's what i wanted. I wanted someone to say, this is going to break stuff or kill me. Just telling me it might not yield any positive results usually won't convince me not to try something.

But telling me i might end up with two dead mics, a dead preamp and maybe a dead engineer, yeah that'll do it.

Next question: How bout filling my bathtub with water, setting up a vocalist in the bathroom, then putting BOTH the preamp and the mic underwater to record the vocalist? I can't think of a SINGLE reason why this is a bad idea :)

thanks for the help though :)
 
brendandwyer said:
Next question: How bout filling my bathtub with water, setting up a vocalist in the bathroom, then putting BOTH the preamp and the mic underwater to record the vocalist?
Click to expand...
Depends on the vocalist.....

G.
 
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