Brand new to patchbays and my brain hurts

  • Thread starter Thread starter BrianHayesMusic
  • Start date Start date
B

BrianHayesMusic

New member
Hello all,

I find myself fairly savvy with most techy things but have to say that all of my Google searching on how to configure my patchbay has seriously baked my brain. All I'm basically trying to do is begin with two different sources (my drum machine and my guitar) and have them plugging in to the same output (my audio interface). It's a little more complicated than that, but I'm pretty sure that if someone could show how to get here, I'll easily figure out the rest. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you,
Brian Hayes
 
Man...for only two pieces...do you really need the PB?
Just plug them directly into the interface.

That said....you really don't explain what it is that you are having difficulty with...?
Basically, outputs on the top, inputs on the bottom.
I don't think you need to get into normal/half-normal if that's all you are going to be plugging in...but again, with only two items, why use a PB?
 
No, I have six different items. I already have two of them plugged into the back sucesfully. I'm just having a difficult time trying to figure out how to have two sources and sending them to the same output.
 
Another example would be trying to get both my drum machine and my guitar signal to go to my loop station. Two sources going to the same output.
 
BrianHayesMusic said:
Another example would be trying to get both my drum machine and my guitar signal to go to my loop station. Two sources going to the same output.
Click to expand...
First, there are inputs and there are outputs. Seems like you are confusing these two. Signal comes out from the output, it does not go in! Car exhaust is output, smoke comes out from it.
And second - you need a mixer or summing box for combining two sources into one. Patchbay is definitely not for that (although depending on the patchbay you MIGHT get it working.).
 
Yeah, with some kind of half-normalled configuration, you could get a signal-split at the PB, and have it go to two inputs....but if you want to combine two outputs to one input, for that...yup, you need some kind of mixer.
 
Patchbays are usually designed to work in two different ways.
I'd suggest googling "half normalised explained", and getting two TRS cables and a multimeter.

You can set them up for straight forward in and out, or for a permanent in/out with a kind of 'interrupt' point.

I hardly ever use patchbays and my memory sucks, so on the rare occasion that I have to use one I just whip out a multimeter and check it out.
 
Yeah, if you want either the drum machine or the guitar - like never both at the same time, but an easy way to switch between them - then you can use the PB. Choose one to be the "default" and half-normal it to the input. The other would get patched to that input when need it, and this would disconnect the first. If you want both at the same time, as others have said, you need a mixer.
 
Great answers, thank you all very much!

So far, I have everything set to "Thru," with four pieces (Line6 Pod, Black Box, Hendrix pedal, Loop station, Digitech RP70) looped through the back. Then, I just plug into the corresponding group on the front to access that particular piece and then from there, straight to my audio interface. And I'm pretty sure I can access any combination of these pieces at once, by cris-crossing from 1B to 2A, as an example, and then keep the chain going by crossing over from 2B to 3A, and so on. My M-Audio Firewire 410 interface has two inputs and so I can plug my guitar into one of them (after passing through the above mentioned pieces) and can plug either my drum machine or my IPhone (for I Real) into the other.

I'm brand new at this so I'm just trying to figure it all out but it will be really cool to have such easy access to all of these pedals and be ready to record at any time.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top