[sdiy] Cable preferences for rig wiring looms ?

[Michael E Caloroso]

I have been using Canare L-2B2AT for interior wiring for ten years.
Easy to work with, lightweight, and good quality.  I even made my own
snake bundles using the Canare cable fished through 1/2" shrink-wrap
and secured with tie wraps.

For external cabling, nothing less than Belden 8412.

I cut corners with cheaper cable and connectors years ago.  Will not
repeat that mistake again.

MC

On 3/28/15, rsdio at audiobanshee.com <rsdio at audiobanshee.com> wrote:
>
> On Mar 28, 2015, at 7:41 AM, Hugh Blemings <hugh at blemings.org> wrote:
>> I'm interested in conventional wisdom around good cable choices for making
>> up custom MIDI and (line level) balanced audio leads.  Said leads will
>> then be bundled/sleeved to make a wiring loom for my live rig to aid quick
>> setup/tear down.
>>
>> Belden 1804a seems a common choice, but it's unclear if the star-quad
>> configuration really accomplishes much at line level ? I assume for MIDI
>> it's of no benefit.
>>
>> Keeping the outside diameter of the cable to 5mm or less is desirable to
>> reduce bulk and weight when sleeving I think.
>>
>> Would be interested in folks experience :)
>
> Hi Hugh,
>
> The requirements for MIDI and audio will be entirely different.
>
> Star-quad is probably still a good choice for any balanced signal, whether
> microphone or line level, because power lines and other electromagnetic
> interference sources will affect both the positive and negative signals more
> equally, and thus will be canceled out more completely at the input.
> Star-quad keeps the geometric center of both signals in effectively the same
> place, and since EMI varies with distance, you want your balanced signal
> halves to be the same. Besides avoiding grounding issues, the whole point of
> balanced is noise immunity; I wouldn't diminish that to save some money just
> because you're running line level. Besides, if you buy star-quad in bulk,
> you'll always have use for it.
>
> As for MIDI, I've used the cheapest, thinnest 2-conductor plus shield (or
> drain) that I can find and it still worked fine with long runs. MIDI is a
> current loop, so it's basically not going to pick up any noise. You just
> need to make sure the cable resistance isn't too high. Shielding is not
> terribly important to protect MIDI from noise, but it might help prevent the
> MIDI signals from radiating into other cables and components.
>
> I'd recommend sourcing two kinds of cables; one for balanced audio
> (star-quad) and one for MIDI (cheap as hell, but covering the basics). It's
> your choice whether to get shielded for the MIDI or not, but if someone else
> has specific experience with MIDI shielding then I'd be interested to hear
> about that as well.
>
> It's been a while since I ordered cable, so I don't have Belden numbers off
> hand.
>
> Brian Willoughby
>
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