Stagebox in the studio

[himey77]

I'm currently pondering my cabling situation for my new home studio. I have my control room in a spare living room and my tracking room in a spare bedroom. I need to run mics, instruments, and headphones to and from my Metric Halo 2882 (4 - 1/4 inputs, 4 - xlr inputs, and 8 - 1/4 outputs). I will have my RNP preamp in the tracking room and I will run line level out of the preamp into the MH 2882, but the rest of the mic lines will go direct from tracking room into the MH in my control room. I also need to run headphone feeds from the 2882's outputs into the control room. (I'm thinking of buying a cheap mixer/s to assist with controlling the headphone feeds).

Issues:

#1 Renting
Although I can drill holes in the walls to put in wall plates (they are ripping the house down when I move out so I can do that , I'm thinking that a stagebox is the best bet. But, what about bypassing the stagebox and just running 50ft of cable right into the preamps, inputs, outputs? I'm thinking this would be pretty messy.

#2 Hiding the cabling
The flooring and walls are already installed, (again, renting) so there is no running cables under a floating floor or through the walls. I'll probably just have to run them where the side wall meets the ceiling right on through to the tracking room. The control room and tracking room are adjacent. Not really a question, more of a confirmation to myself.

#3 Cable Type/ Quality
Cabling seems to be more subjective than people care to admit. I've read that Belden 1800F, Carol cable 8014, and Mogami AES cable is great and this seems to be the direction that I am headed. But what if I go the stagebox or wall plate/snake route?


http://www.directproaudio.com/produc...directid=53759

^^ This looks ideal, but I would never buy Hosa cables. I'd probably have Redco or Hotwired rig me up a stagebox with quality cable.


I feel like I'm drowning in options. Any help would be greatly appreciated.


I know details are limited, but I did not want to discourage advice by providing overkill of information. Please feel free to ask

[Aaronw]

The big question...what's your budget ???

Running a stage box...people do it all the time. Especially in the scenario you're in...renting.

The house I was renting, I always had cables running everywhere. The only trick was trying to keep people from walking on them as little as possible.

[himey77]

The budget for a 50ft snake/stagebox is $300. I should be able to get quality cable for that amount of money.

Aaron, in your situation, were you just running lengths of cable in and out of the rooms? Where did you run your wires?

Anyone ever built a stagebox or had someone build them one? (Hint: I love pictures) I have a soldering iron, but I'm the type of person that would rather pay someone else to do it, if not only for the fear that I would cold-solder every joint...

[Aaronw]

I had the console set up in the living room. I had a 2 space panel w/ XLR's wired up to the mic pre's. I also ran a wire through the wall into the garage and mounted a plate there. Then when I left, I just patched up the hole on the living room side and just put a cover plate on the garage side. Worked out pretty well.

Wiring, not a big deal. Just as long as you stay consistant w/ the color codes on the correct pins. eg: Mogami has the bare wire (shield), one wire is colored (I usually use for pin 2...Hot), and a clear coated wire (I usually use for pin 3...common/neutral/cold).

The biggest thing or most time consuming is the cable prep. Cutting to length, stripping, tinning the wires and connectors, and any shrink wrap, nylon sleeving or numbering that needs to be done. Soldering is the quickest of the whole process. Then beeping out each pin/connector to double check you haven't shorted something out or mispinned something.

For the most part, in the rental situation I was in, I just ran the cables along the floor/wall, under doors, etc.

[himey77]

The more I read about "building" the cabling, the more I feel confident that I can do it myself.

I want to construct something like the wallplate below. I don't know if Julian ever built this box. Has anyone undertaken such a task? Are you using custom boxes and panels or can I find something like this that's premade?

[Aaronw]

Middle Atlantic makes prepunched panels that you can mix and match.

I've wired all but the MIDI cabling.

[himey77]

Thank you Aaron for your replies.

I'm thinking of having http://www.rcicustom.com build me a stagebox that I will mount in my tracking room. On their website it says that stage boxes may be custom configured with nearly any type input or output connectors, and can be delivered hard wired to multi-pair cable or provided with a variety of multi-pin connectors. I'm not sure which option would be best for me at this point. I'm most likely going to insert the snake through the wall and have it terminate at the stagebox in the live room.

Anyone here have RCI make them a stagebox, wall plate, etc.

[Aaronw]

You might call these guys too. I called them for a quote, and they were reasonable... http://cablefactory.com/index.html

[LiveWire]

As for the MIDI line you can just use a balanced line for as long as you would need to go. All you need are pins 2,4,5 the other 2 contacts dont do anything. We have been using standard multipair for MIDI lines in our installs for years and no problems.

I have even heard word of another studio installer trying CAT5e for the Midi lines.

Any custom house could build you that box, but it's not going to happen for $300 we are very competative in our box pricing and I can tell you it's going to run you a little more, so don't be shocked.

Best of luck

[Aaronw]

When I called the cablefactory, I was quoted $50 for a punched panel (24 xlr's) and engraved. (connectors not included, but their only about $3 a piece.

[edenorchestra]

There's these as well:

http://www.jacksmusicfactory.com/defaul ... Wallplates