Mikado463

Mikado463

Audioholic Spartan
OK,OK, I get it....NO rewiring plans....I'm a procrastinater....I've bought every commercially available adapter, etc. I need to plan a day and go thru my system and rid me any/all inline gremlins now that I have 'more knowledge'....THANK YOU ONE AN ALL for your help and advice....Will update this thread and let you know when my 'problem' is solved....When I find that 'rountoit'o_O
still procrastinating ???
 
brad1138

brad1138

Audioholic
What you are doing is called floating a line. There is a lot of misunderstanding about this. It is very easy to create a ground loop.

If you bought your adapters I suspect they are wired like this.


But since the RCA end is the source they need to be wired like this.



Now you might think that this would make no difference.

However only pin one is a ground. Pin 3 is not really a ground and not connected to ground in your amp. Both pins one an two are actually isolated from ground, the pin two carrying the positive side of the wave form, and pin 3 the negative half of the wave form.

So in order to make it work you have to make pin 3 a ground also. Where you do this matters.

This connection needs to have minimal resistance between pin 1 and two at the input to the amp.

If you wire it like the top diagram, then you will very likely create a ground loop because the screen (black) and the blue cable are different and will have small but differing resistances. This is the essence of a ground loop.

The first job is to connect the proamp correctly.

This may not solve it as many pro amps are notorious for internal ground loops when connected unbalanced. Then you will have to use a cheater plug to lift the ground. If you are worried about electric shock then you need to bond all your grounded units to ONE ground with 5 gauge copper wire.
Reviving this because your reply addresses just what I wanted to know. My HT Sub amp (Samson S1000) has XLR & 1/4" TRS inputs. I am currently using the XLR inputs, but I need to switch to an RCA source. If I used RCA to TRS adapters, it would connect 1 & 3 just like your diagram wouldn't it? I happen to have a few of them laying around, and would like to use them as opposed to ordering a pair of RCA to XLR adapters and fixing the wiring.

Thanks

20240429_175334.jpg
 
Speedskater

Speedskater

Audioholic General
Those are not TRS, 1/4 connectors. (Tip, Ring, Sleeve)
They are TS connectors (Tip, Sleeve) not equivalent to an XLR connector.
 
brad1138

brad1138

Audioholic
Those are not TRS, 1/4 connectors. (Tip, Ring, Sleeve)
They are TS connectors (Tip, Sleeve) not equivalent to an XLR connector.
I just found that out (TRS vs TS), but since I have an unbalanced RCA as a source in either case, then it would functionally be the same as an RCA to XLR adapter, wouldn't it?

(EDIT: like this)
g979GXM133-F.jpg
 
Verdinut

Verdinut

Audioholic Spartan
Here is a comprehensive guide to good audio connections:
 
Last edited:
Speedskater

Speedskater

Audioholic General
The photo in post # 24:
RCA unbalanced to TS (Tip, Sleeve) unbalanced.

The photo in post # 26:
RCA unbalanced to XLR balanced.

No, they are different adapters.
 
highfigh

highfigh

Seriously, I have no life.
Just saw this old Bill Whitlock note:
View attachment 67282
Bill Whitlock was a really good presenter of this kind of information- made it understandable without needing a PhD. The first time I attended one of his sessions was in the mid-'80s when I was doing car audio and the second was in 2005, when I worked for a custom integration company.

There's too much "Just do this and everything will be hunky-dory" without showing what was done and without facts behind the 'fix'. I have to ask- how did everyone get by before someone decided to slap batteries on the cables and jack up the prices?
 

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