the little cables between yer pedals

[a Pack of Wolves]

this is crazy
but
i'm just switching from a cheapish $1 colored ones
to brand name ones (yorkville,and rapco)
after years and years

hoping they're actually a good deal better


opinions?

i have a bunch of pedals (say 13)
but never really use more than 3 or 4 max together

i know the signal path is so short between pedals that you can get away with the no-name colored dealies but of course you loose something

my techie pal (who fixes alot of mt gear) thinks if yer using alot of pedals
you should use a direct box at the beginning and end of yer effects chain.
that seems extreme somehow.

----------------------------------------
opinions/thoughts?

[suttree]

um. yorkville cables are crud. you should go with george l's, especially as they're not the kind of cables that usually get kicked around super hard. it'll cost about the same, too. as to a direct box, you should keep the cable runs shortish (under say 20'), and if you're running a lot of pedals a line buffer.

[a Pack of Wolves]

my long cables are under 10 feet

------------------------------

power supply wise i'm using a power-all
and one of the new boss psa deals (w/ the built-in surge protector)

both don't seem to introduce any audible noise

--------------------------------

honestly
i couldn't really tell that there was anything really wrong with the cheap colored ones in terms of 'lack of tone or signal or volume'
but
maybe that was from not using alot of pedals together
or
just not trying to pay attention in that way



now
i'm trying to get the most tone out of my gear
you know that "sonic search we're on",
trying to see what really works for us

when recording/playing rock i've usually kept thing pretty simple
but when doing purely instrumental stuff been more experimental with sound
i think i'm trying to mix it up and have more sounds available to me
when doing 3 minute radio friendly master pieces

this has turned into a rant

[Stratin2traynor]

Hey!! What's wrong with the cheapo colored ones?? I use about 12 pedals hooked up with cheapo cables and they sound great. No noticeable tone loss (to my ears anyways). The only difference I could see being of value with "better" cables is shielding. I have no stage lights or massive electrical interference to deal with so el cheapo works fine for me.

I'm sure that is sacrilege to some but...I would switch only to clean up my board and make custom lengths to fit neat and tidy.

Maybe I'm missing something...

[suttree]

nope you're not missing anything. the cable debate is largely over. beyond a certain minimum, cheap cables sound as good as any boutique brand at short lengths.

but durability varies. the george L is field repairable, and the ends are very nicely turned, and will last a lifetime. when i said the yorkville cables are crud, i mean they're pot metal with poor casting tolerances, and that they don't last. the custom fit nature of the GLs is important, too... no snags no problems, ready to rock and roll.

[zontar]

but durability varies.

That's the important thing. Durable ones will seem to cost almost as much as a regular cable sometimes. I mostly use cableless plugs between my effects--that is a plug with 2 male ends. No cable. My oldest one is showing signs of wearing out--but it still works, and I've had it for over 20 years.

[devnulljp]

Get the George L pedal board kit for $50-ish from guitarpartscanada.com Cheaper than a whole bunch of high quality patch cables, better than $10 worth of cheap ones, cables will be the right length. Problem solved.

[david henman]

That's the important thing. Durable ones will seem to cost almost as much as a regular cable sometimes. I mostly use cableless plugs between my effects--that is a plug with 2 male ends. No cable. My oldest one is showing signs of wearing out--but it still works, and I've had it for over 20 years.


...where do you find them?

-dh

[mhammer]

I've been making my own patch cables for over 30 years, and will note the following:

1) As cable length increases, differences between cables are magnified. So cheap cable and expensive cable are indistinguishable at 6" lengths, fairly distinguishable at 6-8', and like night and day at 25'. Those differences are moderated by the bandwidth of the signal being passed. If it's a Hofner bass with the muting sponge on, that's a world of difference from a symphony orchestra or even an acoustic jazz quintet. Most experts would consider an electric guitar to have a fairly restricted bandwidth i the grand scheme of things.

2) Plugs and jacks are essentially mechanical devices as well as electrical connections. The mechanical stability that creates the electrical continuity can vary widely. Differences in the quality of the rivet-like structure of a jack or plug that holds the parts of the jack/plug in place can result in intermittent contact and irritating noise. Differences in the solidness of contact can have an impact, and that can be a reflection of the materials the component is made from or perhaps tolerances in the thickness or shaping of the plug/jack. Typically, when you splurge for higher quality patch cables, higher quality plugs should come along for the ride. Of course, that assumes the jacks you plug them into are of comparable quality. It takes two to tango there.

3) Pedals and pedalboards vary in the kind of spacing they permit and insist on. Sometimes they create conflicts between what the user needs and what the pedals need. Patch cords vary in their ability to turn the required corners without imposing strain on the cable itself. That being said, individual users vary in terms of how much strain they impose on the components of their pedalboard. Some plan things out well, and some not so much. Cheap patch cables may not survive under the strain of constantly shifting pedal arrangements. Unfortunately, they do not take to re-grafts (i.e., cut the cable at the fractured point and re-solder to the plug) very well.

4) When one's path is buffered, all those interconnections between true-bypassed pedals don't amount to much. If one has a surfeit of boo-teek TB pedals, all that cable can add up when everything is bypassed. After all, a "straight wire" bypass means that the 6" connecting these two pedals and the 6" connecting those two are essentially 12" of cable with some jacks along the way. Add up that cable, and the 15' cable going to the pedals, and the 15-20' going to the amp from the pedals, and second-rate cable properties start to add up.....even with the limited bandwidth of a guitar signal. Consequently, it is an excellent idea to always have one buffer "on" where your guitar meets the pedalboard, so that you get electronic "do-overs" (i.e., the first cable is nt added to all the others after it).

5) There is really no standardization in terms of pedals when it comes to jack-to-jack spacing. That can be because of where the signal jacks are located, the size of the pedal, or simply allowances one has to make for power jacks. As a result, the chances are always excellent that a commercial moulded patch cable will be too short or too long. The ideal is to make one's own custom-length patch cables so that everything is connected the way you need it, without "rabbit ear" cable loops sticking out all over.

6) Where you DO have several pedals whose dimensions are compatible, I encourage folks to use those solid offset right-angle male-to-male connectors. No cable whatsoever. You can buy them commercially, but you can easily make your own for peanuts. I buy right-angle plugs for under a buck apiece, solder a short piece of wire between the signal/tip lugs, and screw the baseplates together. Not only are they cheaper than comemrcial units, but they are actaully a slimmer profile, allowing you to place adjacent pedals even closer together. Of course, that doesn't help when the manufacturer has decided to put the power jack on the side.:mad:

7) I would not advocate ONLY commercial or ONLY DIY patch cables. It is always helpful to have a fistful of those cheap moulded ones hanging around for times when you need to rig something up on an ad hoc basis. Just don't make them take on more responsibility than they can handle.

[Rick31797]

This remindes me of a story,,,hope i dont bore you.

The show Market place>> They decided to buy a large LCD TV and when they went to buy it of course the sales person said they will need to buy a good quaility cable.
There was 3 to choose... Monster cable 265.00 another brand 115.00 and a 3rd brand 12.95
Of course the saleman said the monster cable is the best and you wont loose any picture.
He said the 12.00 is a waste of money.

They ended up buying the monster cable but also had another person go in a buy the other two cables.

They tested all three on the TV and seen no difference.. They took the Cables to the Market place man that is in charge of Video / sound.

He tested all 3 cables and found no signal loss.. They all preformed as well from the 12.00 to the 265.00

The guys and Girls in these stores, are trained to sell the options.. This is where they make there money., But they are misleading the public.

So when i hear about cheap guitar cables sounding just as good as the expensive ones i believe it.

If i was a professional Musician and was on the road alot..I would probably use the better cables, Just becuase i would want the best possible sound playing live, and i think the better cables are made better to take more abuse of being on the road.
but i would have a set of cheap ones there as a spare, backup.

I have seen connections for pedals and there is no cable just two 1/4 jacks end to end.. Looks like a great set up but expensive.

RK

[hollowbody]

...where do you find them?

-dh

+1! I use some of these as well. Planet Waves makes them and they retail for about 6 bucks a piece or something at L&M. The only problem is that the Planet Waves ones are completely solid, no flexibility at all, so you have to use them between pedals that are the same in terms of input/output jack height. So I use one between my Boss DM-3 and CE-2, and the second one I have i can't actually use because no other two pedals of mine have the same height jacks.

So yeah, they're great, but they're also counter-intuitive to some degree. High quality, and no tone loss, but you have to plan ahead.

[devnulljp]

This remindes me of a story,,,hope i dont bore you...tested all three on the TV and seen no difference.. They took the Cables to the Market place man that is in charge of Video / sound.

He tested all 3 cables and found no signal loss.. They all preformed as well from the 12.00 to the 265.00
...
So when i hear about cheap guitar cables sounding just as good as the expensive ones i believe it.
...

This has been done to death I think, but difference is digital vs. analogue. Digital either does or does not work. There is no better, just more expensive. So, if the $12 digital cable works, there's no difference from the overpriced monster cable, except in amount of cash going to the store. This is all marketing.

Analogue is different, you can get signal degradation--be it signal loss or interference of whatever--so there is a range of quality. I can definitely hear a difference between the extremes of a really cheap cable vs. a better quality one. But the biggest issue IMO is shielding

[sproul07]

I've gone through the George L's and they sounded pretty good. I'm using Evidence Audio Melody patch cables right now and I don't see myself switching anytime soon. Great sound!

[iaresee]

This has been done to death I think, but difference is digital vs. analogue. Digital either does or does not work. There is no better, just more expensive. So, if the $12 digital cable works, there's no difference from the overpriced monster cable, except in amount of cash going to the store. This is all marketing.

Analogue is different, you can get signal degradation--be it signal loss or interference of whatever--so there is a range of quality. I can definitely hear a difference between the extremes of a really cheap cable vs. a better quality one. But the biggest issue IMO is shielding
I'm not advocating Monster Cables in any way shape or form here but I will say that your "Digital either does or does not work" statement is mostly wrong. Digital signals on cables are analog signals and are privy to all the usual problems that happen to analog signals on long wire runs (reflection at interfaces, leading edge degradation due to capacitance, amplitude degradation due to resistance, etc.).

The difference is that a digital signal can be sent such that errors in the signal at the receivers end can be detected and corrected for automatically in a much more advanced way than it can be done with analog signals. So a digital signal, especially a serially transmitted digital signal, can tolerate more noise and physical issues with its cable but only to a point. When an error correcting algorithm cannot recreate the missing bit the system designers can do one of two things: 1) throw some sort of panic and stop processing the stream; or 2) guess at what the bit should have been. 99.999% of interface designers out there will apply a guess heuristic when it comes to consumer audio and video transmission because none of us will notice a bit or two being lost here or there in a signal. If you start to lose a lot of the signal in transmission and the guessing algorithm starts to get called on a little too frequently you'll start to see a jagged picture or the audio will glitch as the image or sound gets dithered by the guessing algorithm. Yes, it's still working but it looks and/or sounds like junk.

With analog you're pretty much limited to differential signal transmission to correct for errors introduced during transmission and that's it.

Back in the "old days" when we used parallel signal transmission to send lots of data between digital devices the analog effects on the signals were particularly nasty to deal with. You had to handle the case where your 24 incoming signals may no longer be aligned to your clock signal. Nasty. I can remember long nights spent in the lab trying to get two 24-bit buss interfaces between proto boards to sync up properly. It was nasty work. Good riddance to parallel I/O. High speed serial transmission makes this less of an issue, you don't have to deal with aligning 24 signals to a clock signal, you can infer the clock from the incoming signal and you don't have to align multiple analog signals to the clock before you sample the signals to determine if they're 1's or 0'.

[Rick31797]

I don't know anything about Digital, Analog signals.. All i kmow is the guy that tested it and works for market place show.. hooked all three cables up to a tester... ( not a tester you can buy at The source) and they all where equal.

I know everything here has been talked about over and over again. Debates over this and that.. just thought somebody might find it interesting.

RK

[iaresee]

I don't know anything about Digital, Analog signals.. All i kmow is the guy that tested it and works for market place show.. hooked all three cables up to a tester... ( not a tester you can buy at The source) and they all where equal.

I know everything here has been talked about over and over again. Debates over this and that.. just thought somebody might find it interesting.

RK
My post wasn't meant to say, "Go spend more than $12 on a cable." I don't think you should dump your money on cables. I'm just saying that it's not binary when it comes to digital signal transmission (pun intended). You can get signal loss and noise, it's not an "it works or it doesn't" scenario.

[devnulljp]

My post wasn't meant to say, "Go spend more than $12 on a cable." I don't think you should dump your money on cables. I'm just saying that it's not binary when it comes to digital signal transmission (pun intended). You can get signal loss and noise, it's not an "it works or it doesn't" scenario.

I'd disagree. Digital either works or it doesn't. It's binary 1 or 0 by definition. Sure, cheap crap cables will have a higher incidence of drops, but I define that as doesn't work. Two digital cables that 'work' (above a certain threshold of 'not working') will work the same regardless of price. When was the last time you shopped around for different quality USB cables?

We're all in agreement though, those $200+ monster cables are a rip-off, we just differ on the level(s) at which the ripoff is being perpetrated.

[mhammer]

You are correct that the code is binary, so in theory it should either work or not. Trouble is that the code is transmitted as very high-speed logical (square-wave) pulses. While cable capacitance plays a very different role in digital transmission than it does on something like the bandwidth of an analog signal, it still plays a role. If cable capacitance effects exist in a given digital transmission cable, they can impact on making those sweet little square waves more like triangles or sinusoidal pulses. At that point, you have to hope and pray that the receiving device is able to reliably interpret all those sinusoidal peaks as if they were square waves.

[iaresee]

I'd disagree. Digital either works or it doesn't. It's binary 1 or 0 by definition.
Again, not true. Lets take a digital video stream being sent over a cable. You can be losing information in the transmission stream and the television will attempt to correct for the loss through dithering algorithms. There is gradient to amount of information that can be lost, it can be minor (one pixel dropped per frame), mildly annoying (a few pixels here in there lost per frame), or really bad (losing swaths of pixels resulting in "the jaggies" as the dithering algorithms try to compensate).

That is not a binary, working or not working, scenario. There may be a binary point where you personally can't tolerate the problem any more. I'm just pointing out that digital transmission is analog transmission is full of a spectrum of problems. :smile:

Sure, cheap crap cables will have a higher incidence of drops, but I define that as doesn't work. Two digital cables that 'work' (above a certain threshold of 'not working') will work the same regardless of price.
Your tolerance threshold may be binary, but the error rates are not. :)

When was the last time you shopped around for different quality USB cables?
A few weeks ago when I wanted to run a 25 ft USB link from a USB port on a workstation to a protoboards sitting on a shelf here in my lab at work actually. The EMF noise in the lab is so high I had to source a mil-spec USB cable with an extra layer of shielding.

It was a nasty problem to debug. At first we thought the the programming files we'd produced were wrong. Maybe it was our software that was outputting the wrong JTAG stream? Or perhaps the USB ByteBlaster interface on the board we'd built was messed up? Or (really bad) our chip was screwed up (I was testing a new device)? After going through the usual debug routine to eliminate those things we put the scope on the USB header on the board and you could watch the interference on the line. Three days lost because we're in a downsized office and the UPS for our server room now shares a room with our lab.

I now know what a $200 USB cable is worth. :)

We're all in agreement though, those $200+ monster cables are a rip-off, we just differ on the level(s) at which the ripoff is being perpetrated.
I don't think we're even talking about the same things. I'm just trying to demystify the "digital cable" -- it's an analog cable carrying an analog signal that just gets dealt with differently at the other end.

[zontar]

+1! I use some of these as well. Planet Waves makes them and they retail for about 6 bucks a piece or something at L&M. The only problem is that the Planet Waves ones are completely solid, no flexibility at all, so you have to use them between pedals that are the same in terms of input/output jack height. So I use one between my Boss DM-3 and CE-2, and the second one I have i can't actually use because no other two pedals of mine have the same height jacks.

So yeah, they're great, but they're also counter-intuitive to some degree. High quality, and no tone loss, but you have to plan ahead.

I have one that isn't straight--it's offset--so it can be used between two different pedals--whether the jacks are different heights or line up differently. It works great between my DOD Classic Tube and my Boss pedals. It's basically 2 90 degree plugs stuck together.

The brand is Hosa (http://www.hosatech.com/hosa/products/GPP-146_and_GPP-296.html)

[a Pack of Wolves]

so a buddy a i took a bunch of smallish (rapco and yorkville) cables and cut the to the right length and resoldered the ends (and added some hot glue)

the yorkville ones are actually pretty good when the heat shrink is removed and the soldering done up really well (also w/ glue added inside post-solder)

the ends are very good on both kinds,i had a few switchcraft ends (probably some of the best you can get) but the ones i had turned out to be real solid.we even tested each cables output on a meter to make sure eveything was working well.

it was abit of a task (a few hours and a few beers)
but now i have cables meant for the job
and they should last for years on end

any cables that you don't solder (like the planetwaves kit) aren't going to hold up overtime

i never had any reason to make my own cables before
(i'm sure i could have done it long time ago)
funtimes

i'll admit w/ the colored ones i didn't notice any tone or volume loss either
it's just nice to feel all tucked in and warm

[devnulljp]

Again, not true. Lets take a digital video stream being sent over a cable. You can be losing information in the transmission stream and the television will attempt to correct for the loss through dithering algorithms. There is gradient to amount of information that can be lost, it can be minor (one pixel dropped per frame), mildly annoying (a few pixels here in there lost per frame), or really bad (losing swaths of pixels resulting in "the jaggies" as the dithering algorithms try to compensate).

That is not a binary, working or not working, scenario. There may be a binary point where you personally can't tolerate the problem any more. I'm just pointing out that digital transmission is analog transmission is full of a spectrum of problems. :smile:


Your tolerance threshold may be binary, but the error rates are not. :)


A few weeks ago when I wanted to run a 25 ft USB link from a USB port on a workstation to a protoboards sitting on a shelf here in my lab at work actually. The EMF noise in the lab is so high I had to source a mil-spec USB cable with an extra layer of shielding.

It was a nasty problem to debug. At first we thought the the programming files we'd produced were wrong. Maybe it was our software that was outputting the wrong JTAG stream? Or perhaps the USB ByteBlaster interface on the board we'd built was messed up? Or (really bad) our chip was screwed up (I was testing a new device)? After going through the usual debug routine to eliminate those things we put the scope on the USB header on the board and you could watch the interference on the line. Three days lost because we're in a downsized office and the UPS for our server room now shares a room with our lab.

I now know what a $200 USB cable is worth. :)


I don't think we're even talking about the same things. I'm just trying to demystify the "digital cable" -- it's an analog cable carrying an analog signal that just gets dealt with differently at the other end.

Good info in this thread - thanks folks.

[allthumbs56]

While I have always been intrigued by the solderless kits, I've always had success using a blend of the little cheap coloured guys between close pedals and handmade ones for longer runs (8" - 24"). The handmade ones are typically made from a sacrificed guitar cable cut to varying lengths and I buy the connectors at the local electronic supplier. I usually make my own power supply cables (9V) as this allows me to cutomize those lengths too.

Biggest pet peeve is pedals with the power jacks on the side - always seem to get in the way and limit my placements :mad:

[zontar]

any cables that you don't solder (like the planetwaves kit) aren't going to hold up overtime



I've got one I've used for almost 27 years--still works.
It's not my main cable--but it's one I grab whenever I sue more than one effects pedal or my rack mount echo. I also use it with my bass.