Mic cables?

[pikingrin]

Alright, I was reading through these pages the other day, here in the mic forum, and I came across a link to redco.com. After drooling over the cheap bulk microphone cables they have for sale, I was hit with a hardcore case of gearlust, albeit on a smaller scale. All of the sudden I was stricken with the "need" to upgrade all the cables in my studio.

My question is, as I am viewing the different choices of cables offered, what is the difference between a "standard" mic cable and a "quad" mic cable, other than the number of seperate wires in them? Seeing as how I want to upgrade not only my mic cables, but also my TRS patch cables, would either of the two cables be geared more towards either of the two?

All help and most opinions are greatly appreciated!

 

[petermiller]

quad cable is just that, 4 conductors or 2 pair and a shield. quad cable can be a real good choice. Its more like icreasing the guage of wire with the two conductors per phase and antiphase. In an xlr connection this is fine, as is a trs connector. What you should be more concerned about is what type of connector is used (i.e., what make is it). regular 2 conductor with shield is fine as well. I would prefer mogami with neutrik connectors. although belden, canare are good as well. You may find that if you are using quad in a patchbay with trs connectors that the wire is not quite as supple as the 2 cond when bent. Thats about the only difference between the two for either type of connection.

 

[BigRay]

Quad cable offers much more RF rejection. Other than that, no benefits over standard cable. If RF is a problem for you..Quad is the way to go.

 

[xstatic]

Quad connectors still work when one of the conductors is broken as well.