Length of Patch Cords / guitar Cables

ShanPeyton

ShanPeyton

Member
How long is too long for certain applications? For instance the cable going from the Amp to the Cab? and from the guitar to the amp?

Does the length of a cable even work against tone and functionality? If so what is it?
 
Long cords (15, 20 ft?) and very high impedance sources (guitar pickups) can begin to attenuate the highs.
Lower impedance sourceless -line level, power amps feeding speakers, the cable's effect is not much at all.
- an exception; long lines and high power, you want larger wire to keep the voltage losses down.

Now they say Jimmy Hendrix for example used a 20' coil cord? Ick !
But what if he'd used a fancy short one?
Prolly would'of just used a little less highs at the amp
:p
 
Can't imagine you'd notice unless you were going for crazy long lengths. I use the shortest possible between pedals etc just cos it's tidier. Relatively long cable from guitar to the first pedal.
 
Depends on the capacitance of the cable per unit length, and the pickup/s i.e. peaky low output single coils are most sensitive to the capacitance effect, and then how sensitive your own ears are to the difference. Experienced players and recording engineers can hear small differences, others just the very obvious 'dull' results of lots and lots of capacitance. Either way there is both a pickup resonant frequency shift downwards and a high end roll off above that as capacitance increases:

Guitar Cable Capacitance and Resonant Frequency

Hope this helps.

Cheers,

Marc.
 
I use very long cables. 25 ft from guitar to board, a couple feet in little board patch cables, then 30 or so more feet to the amp. An additional 60 feet going back and forth to the effects loop if I use an amp with an effects loop. You know what? I don't hear anything that bugs me about it, and I'm pretty picky. A buffered pedal first or last or both in your chain pretty much makes up for the long cable runs. You're not losing anything in a long cable run that can't be made up for with a little tiny tweak of the treble or presence knob. Don't worry about it.
 
Brilliant. Absolutely Brilliant. this makes me happy. I need to pick up a few longer cables now, i found a hole in the back of my room that goes out into the big empty rec room we NEVER use in our basement. So i think i am going to make that my Cabinets home while i work on some tones and keep them Amp head on the desk next to me. Super stoked.
 
I ditto greg's post ........ I never worry about the length of cable runs ...... some players actually prefer the slight treble loss you get with a longer cable which is why coil cords have made a slight comeback.
 
ShanPeyton said:
Brilliant. Absolutely Brilliant. this makes me happy. I need to pick up a few longer cables now, i found a hole in the back of my room that goes out into the big empty rec room we NEVER use in our basement. So i think i am going to make that my Cabinets home while i work on some tones and keep them Amp head on the desk next to me. Super stoked.
Click to expand...

I do that sometimes with my cabs. I put them out in the front entryway and leave the heads in here with me. You just need a long speaker cable.
 
I use long cords...it's about mobility. Once I have the guitar around my neck, I don't have to take it off every time I want to step more than 5 feet from the amp.
I often need to walk from the amp to my tape recorder or to the mixer...etc...so the long cord is a necessity, plus I have a long headphone cord tied to the guitar chord, so it's a two-cord harness...that way I am free to move without ever taking the headphones or guitar off if I don't want to.

I also have short cords....and I don't notice any difference in sound quality.
 
Note: for the amp to speaker make sure you use speaker cable, not an instrument cable. Thicker conductors (usually side-by-side instead of power/shield) to handle the extra power/conduction.
 
mjbphotos said:
Note: for the amp to speaker make sure you use speaker cable, not an instrument cable. Thicker conductors (usually side-by-side instead of power/shield) to handle the extra power/conduction.
Click to expand...

I think currently there is a small instrument cable. I'd have to double check.
 
amp to speaker really needs to be a speaker cable even if it's just zip cord.
At low volumes an instrument cable will work but at higher volumes their inner conductor is too small to pass the power thru and further, they can even overheat melting the inner insulation and causing a direct short!

So if you're gonna run a long cable from amp to speaker and then crank it you MUST use a speaker cable.
 
Lt. Bob said:
amp to speaker really needs to be a speaker cable even if it's just zip cord.
At low volumes an instrument cable will work but at higher volumes their inner conductor is too small to pass the power thru and further, they can even overheat melting the inner insulation and causing a direct short!

So if you're gonna run a long cable from amp to speaker and then crank it you MUST use a speaker cable.
Click to expand...

Noted. You guys are so awesome.
 
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