John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

I personally like switchcraft because they're the old reliable standby, but Neutrik is often just as good, and sometimes more inovative.

How many lines are you running?

I just bought an eight-pack XLR panel input's, so 4 XLR on each panel, and probably two or three TRS inputs. I tore apart an old equalizer that didn't work anymore and stole the TRS input's out of that, so I'll be using these unless I can find some good quality TRS inputs. There are only four here though, I'd like to have probably 4 on each side if I can. So somewhere from 4 XLR and 4 TRS to 4 XLR to 2 TRS on each panel. Can ya help me out!

I still need some clarification on a few things. . .

1) Hollow door, how well it will actually hold up, and how I should construct it exactly.

2) Exact type of insulation that would be the best

and finally

3) Which type of wallboard I should finally choose.


Am I looking at being able to find these things at the local home depot

1) Hollow door, how well it will actually hold up, and how I should construct it exactly.

I think that, in your particular case, you would get better results with a SOLID, SLAB type exterior door with wood casing, installed per the info in the DOOR link (REFERENCE section, top of the Construction forum) - you may find this type at HD, depends on which store; they seem to carry different stuff at different areas.

2) Exact type of insulation that would be the best

Roxul AFB's, 2.5 PCF, everywhere for everything. Probably NOT Home Depot, more like commercial insulation supply houses. Call every one in your area until you find one that will sell to the public in smaller quantities. OC 703 in place of the above, if you can find it and pay the higher price - performance-wize, NO DIFFERENCE. Do NOT bother with HD for insulation, unless you can't find either of the products I mentioned; and then, ONLY use fiberglass inside the walls; higher density than normal, and enough so that it has to be compressed slightly to mount the wallboard.


3) Which type of wallboard I should finally choose.

If you're using RC, same source as the Roxul; another possibility would be Drywall Contractor Supply houses; I've gotten it locally at such places for $2.16 per 12 foot piece (that was almost a year ago; steel's gone crazy since then, it might be $5 per stick by now)

Wallboard - HD is fine - for a closet, the 4x8 sheets are all you can use anyway, just get standard 5/8" gypsum; no X-core, firecode, etc - a double layer of 5/8 standard drywall will exceed the rest of your house anyway.

Check out the REFERENCE section's "complete section" thread for more on drywall do's and don'ts... Steve

knightfly wrote:. . . just get standard 5/8" gypsum; no X-core, firecode, etc. . .

There. That's the source of my confusion about what gypsum to get!

I see that as get 5/8" stuff that is not firecode. Yet, the suppliers tell me that all 5/8" stuff is firecode, so its an oxymoron.

(Don't mean to hijack the thread... Just trying to keep others from being similarly confused...)

"the suppliers tell me that all 5/8" stuff is firecode" - print out my previous explanation on YOUR thread and show it to them; apparently they have the same problem discerning between "fire RATED wall" and "fire CODE gypsum" - IOW, you can BUILD a "fire RATED wall" with ANY gypsum wallboard, all it takes is a knowledge of the applicable codes as to how MUCH gypsum is required, and the type of frame; or, if you want to save a slight amount of space and weight, you can use 1/2" fire CODE (X-core) gypsum in place of 5/8 STANDARD gypsum and achieve the same fire RATING.

This stuff is as arcane as the NEC, but that's about as clear as I can make it... Steve

I got my wire, I got my panels made, I'm ready to solder. Now I have a question.

1) The wire I got is "install" wire from a local shop here. He seemed to know what he was talking about but the wire itself seems pretty small. I won't be moving the wire around, it'll be in the wall, so it's not really a concern, but is this wire a little TOO small?

2) Secondly, when doing TRS and XLR cables, does it matter which wire I wire to each pin, tip, sleeve, ground. Just as long as I maintain the precendent for all of them? i.e. I use the red wire for pin 1, use red wire for pin 1 on everything?

3) Third, do I have to worry about phantom power in this case? I will use a few mics that have phantom power. Will the wires carry the current or do I need a separate wire for that too?

1) The wire I got is "install" wire from a local shop here. He seemed to know what he was talking about but the wire itself seems pretty small. I won't be moving the wire around, it'll be in the wall, so it's not really a concern, but is this wire a little TOO small?

Looks like maybe 16 or 18 gauge, even 20 gauge is heavy enough; should be fine.

2) Secondly, when doing TRS and XLR cables, does it matter which wire I wire to each pin, tip, sleeve, ground. Just as long as I maintain the precendent for all of them? i.e. I use the red wire for pin 1, use red wire for pin 1 on everything?

electrically, you're right; but for least confusion, normally in electronics we wire the red to high and black to low in a balanced line, and the bare wire is the shield (ground) -

3) Third, do I have to worry about phantom power in this case? I will use a few mics that have phantom power. Will the wires carry the current or do I need a separate wire for that too

Any standard mic cable will handle phantom; it's usually just a few milliamps, with both signal wires having 48 volts; the ground wire is the return. Just don't hook up some sort of balanced-to-unbalanced adapter on one of those cables with phantom power applied, or you'll smoke the power supply by shorting phantom power to ground... Steve

Everything sounded great, until I read this part. . .

Any standard mic cable will handle phantom; it's usually just a few milliamps, with both signal wires having 48 volts; the ground wire is the return. Just don't hook up some sort of balanced-to-unbalanced adapter on one of those cables with phantom power applied, or you'll smoke the power supply by shorting phantom power to ground... Steve

I have a Delta 1010lt card. Which, is unbalanced inputs. They are RCA inputs. So I am going from microphone with phantom power -> mixer (provides phantom power) -> sound card (which has UNbalanced RCA inputs)

mic -> mixer -> soundcard

The delta DOES have one or two XLR inputs, which is good, but what do I do about the rest *IF* I record multiple phantom power microphones. Thanks

Dave

Steve's saying don't do this: Mixer providing phantom>cable>bal/unbal adapter>cable>mic.

Phantom power only has to do with powering mics (and some other devices) on the same cable as the mic's input. It's DC power signal that basically runs on the same wire as the AC audio signal.

You're mixer has no phantom power out on outputs, so you'll be fine.

Ahh, silly me, if I would have stopped and thought about it. OUTputs from the mixer, it's not gonna be powering anything! lol. Thanks for clearing that up though none-the-less.

Dave

2) Secondly, when doing TRS and XLR cables, does it matter which wire I wire to each pin, tip, sleeve, ground. Just as long as I maintain the precendent for all of them? i.e. I use the red wire for pin 1, use red wire for pin 1 on everything?

Pin 1 is always shield. Most equipment now days is Pin 2 hot, but some older gear, may be pin 3 hot. With the wire you have (Shield, Red, Black) I would do the following pinout for XLR:

1 Shield
2 Red
3 Black

For 1/4" TRS

Sleeve Shield
Tip Red
Ring Black

And keep it consistant with the entire studio.