Do Vactrol relays affect sound? Or popless speaker switcher.

GroupDIY Audio Forum

Help Support GroupDIY Audio Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

TheGuitarist

Well-known member
Joined
Apr 5, 2009
Messages
495
Location
Australia
So this may be a stupid question, but will they affect tone or the sound of a line level source.

Basically i have Igor's CRM and as it only has 3 speaker outputs, one of them being a latching sub, i essentially have two outputs to power my ns10s, a set of JBLs, and the soffit mounts. Yes i could get rid of one speaker but i don't want to because it would affect my mixing.

Basically i've done similar stuff with normal switches from the local electronics store and stuff popped, this was with self powered speakers, so it wasn't too bad because they weren't cranked, but now that i use the CRM and have my NS-10s amped with an amp that doesn't have independent volume control (thats what the CRM is for after all) i don't want to put a switch between the ns-10 and the CRM because i really don't want to blow tweeters.

Is it just because they are cheap switches that this is happening? Should i use a vactrol relay, or will normal relays be fine, they seem to be on igor's box, but there may be something i'm missing there.

Any help would be great.
 
There are generally two reasons why switches pop (or click).
One is that there is some DC residual due to improper DC decoupling. I guess it's not the case.
The other is that switching a live signal results in puncturing holes in the signal, particularly when there is significant LF contents.
Using relays insted of mechanical switches won't change a thing because they are hard switches.
The only solutions are:
Zero-crossing switching, i.e. actually allowing the switch to go off at the very instant the signal crosses the 0v line, and allowing it to go on at a subsequent zero-crossing. This can be done only with sophisticated circuitry.
Ramping, i.e. fading out one signal and fading in another. This can be done with VCA's or with Vactrols. Adequate timing of the control currents must be catered for.
See attached for vactrol application.
 

Attachments

  • vactrol switching.jpg
    vactrol switching.jpg
    29.5 KB · Views: 44

Latest posts

Back
Top