Length Of Cables Runs On Computer?

Hi
I've been pondering on this for a while, i'm thinking of putting my dedicated music recording computer in another room. It has a case fan 3 psu fans and the main chip fan. And its noisy, i also have a mains input filtering unit that throws out a bit of a buzz as well. I was thinking of doing the quite fan and box thing but i think there's too many fans to replace. So the question is how long can i make the connecting leads from my computer to the keyboard, mouse, and monitor, am i going to have problems with say a 25 foot run. The other question is, should i put my mic preamps as near as possible to my mics or will they do with 25 foot leads and then the preamp? Just to make it more interesting i'm trying to record classical guitar!
Vikki(uk) :grin:

Extending the keyboard/mouse/monitor cables is not a problem. 10m should be fine. If you need longer runs you can buy converter boxes that transfer the signals through cat 5 cable (up to 1-200m).

Best regards,

Mikkel C. Simonsen

Many thanks.
Vikki(uk) :green:

For the price of the extender box, and all the cables, you could have a silence case though... Gonna be building about ten in order to keep the cost down, and selling seven of them, within the next month or two. Would you be interested? We think (haven't bought all the materials yet) they're gonna run about $300 CDN w/ temp. control etc..

W.

Hi
Thanks, i've just dropped on some cable today and just making some leads up, if its not a success i'll be in touch.
Vikki(uk) :grin:

We have a load of those whisper racks here... they've been really disappointing on the whole. A couple of people have DIY'd them with only marginally better results... :sad:

keith

Not a whisper rack, or a modified PC case. We're actually building a complete isolation box for a PC. You place the existing PC case in it, it contains sound proofing material, as well as temperature control systems to make sure the system doesn't get cooked, etc...

W.

woah, I found trouble when trying to extend monitor cables... I wouldn't extend them over 6 feet (if at all) I have two LCD monitors that both experienced a scrolling noise when run through extension cables. I later bought "good" cables(more than what i paid for the monitors) with similar but slightly less noise. I tested everything including ground loops and creating mesh shielding around the cables with no real improvement. I tried 3 feet extensions with about half the noise, and when plugged straight to the computer, no noise. I settled for a silent fan setup and a nosie barrier around the computer. can't even tell it's there now.

good luck!

Vikki;
Good idea, make it happen it is the best choice.
Be aware of these issues.
Mouse and keyboard to 100' no problem.
USB no more up to 10' (feet) sorry wrong units for you.
You can buy a 16" repeater USB cable and string 4 together max.
After that you need a USB to fiber back to USB to do it.

The VGA monitor cable is an issue.
I did a A/V install for a conference room and got bitten by the VGA cable, the laptop did not have enough voltage to drive 50' of quality cable.
Had to buy a $169USD video distrubition amp.

You should be able to go 50' with good compleatly sheilded VGA cable $80.00USD so it is not cheap. If you need a VGA amplifier be prepared to spend the dough, or in your case the pounds.

Can be done. Walking to put a disk in the PC you will think it is too far away.

Hearing yourself think in a quiet room will be worth it!

The other question is, should i put my mic preamps as near as possible to my mics or will they do with 25 foot leads and then the preamp? Just to make it more interesting i'm trying to record classical guitar!

Click to expand...

Definitely put the mic-pre as close to the performer as you feasibly can, then drive a balanced o/p from the pre at line-level to your recorder etc. Bear in mind that a +4 balanced line will have several times the voltage of a mic-line, therefore you will suffer less degradation from resistance in the cable / ingress of airborne noise etc. Transformer balancing is king for noise rejection on long lines, but you should still get a decent CMR spec from a non-xformer balanced line.

Justin

To run a monitor at some distance from the computer, it would be worthwhile to try a couple of "breakouts" that adapt the 15-pin D-connectors to five BNCs. (The signals on these five BNCs are red, green, blue, horizontal sync and vertical sync). Then run five identical lengths of low-loss 75-ohm coax between the two breakouts. Belden 1855A is a thin, easy-to-use yet low-loss coax rated for use up to 2GHz. It's even good enough for 1080i HDTV over moderate distances.

At my job, we are responsible for some auditorium systems that include video projectors driven by the VGA output of a PC, and this method has worked great over distances of more than 50 feet. This is using regular RG59/U type like Belden 8279, so greater distances should be possible with 1855A.

If you use breakouts, be sure to get the type that break out to BNCs at the shortest possible distance from the 15-pin D connector.