studio connections

[jimmycs780]

I need some help. I am in the prosess of wiring up my home studio. The gear is as follows:
creation station PC
002 rack factory
alesis 3630 comp
alesis microverb
lexicon mpx1
digitech 2120 guitar pre
ada mp1 guitar pre
ada mp2 guitar pre
ada micro tube 100 power amp
bbe sonic maximizer
aphex aural exciter
beringer ultra curve eq
neutrick patchbay

I would like to connect everything (including the ins and out of the 002 and the l&r outs fx sends and returns) to the patch bay. Ideally I would be able to quickly change signal chain from the patch bay(s). Is this possible?
can I use this patchbay if so how?
and what the hell is normalled and half normalled.
I am open to suggestions so please feel free. I want to finish this and get a good layout design.
thanks
Jimmy

 

[Adam P]

You should be able to do everything you want with a patchbay. It'll be pricey though.

Normalled means that the signal that appears at a point in the top row will appear at the point right below it on the bottom row. If you have a 48 point bay, for example, 1 would be normalled to 25, 2 to 26, etc etc. Inserting a cable into the point on either the top or bottom row will interrupt the connection from top row to bottom row.

Half-normalled means the same thing, except that if you insert a cable into a jack on the top row, the signal that passes to the corresponding point on the bottom row will NOT be broken. You will have, in effect, split the signal. Inserting a cable into a point on the bottom row still interrupts the signal.

Not normalled means that with no cables plugged into any points, signals that appear on the top row will not appear on the bottom row. You must use a cable to establish a connection.

I think most people typically set their patchbays up so that outputs show up on the top row, with their corresponding inputs on the bottom row. Whether or not they're normalled or not depends on the type of gear that's on that particular pair of points. For example, I would normal insert points (so that the signal is not broken), but it would not normal a pair of points that contained a compressor input and output, because this would create a loop (although that loop would be broken as soon as a cable was inserted). Also, if you have particular pieces of gear that you always use on a particular insert or aux send/return, you could normal it into that point (for example, Insert send normalled to comp input, comp output normalled to insert return). That saves you from having to use a pair of patch cables to use the piece of gear, but still allows you to insert it into a different signal path if you so desire.