compression LED's maxing out

[detuned6]

I noticed this last night and thought it was strange . My compressor is hooked up to my patch bay( i think half norm) thats it, i had no cables in the front patching it no no other gear , and when i turn the output a little past 0 db the LED max's out . when i turn it a hair down past 0db theres no signal. How can i be getting a signal reading on the led's if the dam thing is not hooked up to nothing????(besides the rear of the patch bay) This happens on both channels.wtf!

 

[littledog]

Some people put the inputs of a piece of gear right under the outputs (in terms of how it's patched into the patchbay). That makes it convenient for labelling, but if so, you want to use an open configuration, not half-normalled, for those patch points. Otherwise you get a feedback loop. I've done it myself by accident.

The easy solution is not to put the inputs and outputs of any piece of gear directly in line with eachother on the patchbay. Doing so doesn't take advantage of any normalling anyway, since that's never the way you're actually going to patch in real life. Maybe put the compressor inputs under the outputs of your favorite mic pre instead.

The sure way to tell if you're getting a feedback loop is to plug a patch cable into the bottom of the pair of jacks on the patchbay. This breaks the loop - I'm betting your LED's go dark immediately.

 

[detuned6]

I figurerd this out a couple of hours ago, that inserting a cable breaks the "loop". I am runing my compressor half normeled. I never had this "feedback loop" problem before until i switched rack cases the other day. If i leave a cable in one of the jacks i should be all set, right?