Microphone cable differences

[Studiogearlover]

hey guys... this is just an interesting experiment and I would like to ask your opinion.

There are some of us who does not believe in mic or any audio cable differences at all, but interestingly I have witnessed differences myself. So I would like to some insight and would like to hear your opinion about this.

Mic pre is a Neve M88 and mic's are dynamic's for speech. Shure SM57 and EV ND's.

I have a factory made Warm audio XLR cable vs a Van De Hul high quality copper/silver soldered and custom made cable to compare.

Significant differences:

1. The custom made cable needs more gain to meet the warm audio cable at least 25% more gain
2. The warm audio cable produces more "ess"-es on recording a human voce
3. Van de Hul cable seems to be more flat, less high frequency hisses ( i thought to be the opposite due to low ohm cable producing kore HF's)
4. Noise I am not sure...the van der hul cable does like the sm57. I hear a lot of "wind wobble" noise while with the Warm audio cable is super silent
5. Th Ev ND457 mic like more the van der hul mic cable in terms of warmth, but also needs more gain to meet the warm audio cable

I am not techy so I can not explain why these cables are performing so differently. The difference is not like a little, its night and day and one with one mic sounds better than the other and vice versa. I was not paying too much attention so far for the cables but this very simple experiences and obvious differences makes me wonder...

What do you guys have on this? Would love to hear you opinions...

 

[Murdock]

I guess this was not a blind test?

 

[rogs]

I shall be very surpised if anyone here would even think of paying the kind of money those 'Van de Hul' cables are priced at.
So it seems unlikely that anyone will be able to make any scientific comparison measurements.

Presumably those cables come complete with a large tube of 'snake oil' ? ...

 

[Studiogearlover]

I guess this was not a blind test?

no.. but needs to be? I have tested two cables with two mic's vica versa and sharing what I've heard... i am more puzzled of the noise and the gain differences...why is it sooo evident giving the fact that one cable is generic and the other is a higher grade one...

 

[Studiogearlover]

I shall be very surpised if anyone here would even think of paying the kind of money those 'Van de Hul' cables are priced at.
So it seems unlikely that anyone will be able to make any scientific comparison measurements.

Presumably those cables come complete with a large tube of 'snake oil' ? ...

i donno man.. i am just sharing what i am experiencing with these... the sm57 sounds way better with the warm audio cable tho..

 

[Murdock]

no.. but needs to be? I have tested two cables with two mic's vica versa and sharing what I've heard... i am more puzzled of the noise and the gain differences...why is it sooo evident giving the fact that one cable is generic and the other is a higher grade one...

You can’t imagine how easily our ears and brain are fooled… we can hear things we want to hear and don’t hear things we don’t want to. With blind testing you kind of avoid the bias.

How did you come up with the „25% more gain“ needed? How many dB‘s of gain did you have to add? Was it the same with both mics? Only thing I can imagine is a fault with the cable if the gain difference is that drastic.

 

[Dylan W]

There are definitely sonic differences between cables. A significant gain difference seems unusual though. Have you checked that the wiring is correct? Maybe you’d like to post some clips?

 

[Studiogearlover]

You can’t imagine how easily our ears and brain are fooled… we can hear things we want to hear and don’t hear things we don’t want to. With blind testing you kind of avoid the bias.

How did you come up with the „25% more gain“ needed? How many dB‘s of gain did you have to add? Was it the same with both mics? Only thing I can imagine is a fault with the cable if the gain difference is that drastic.

Totally get it what you mean as I was skeptical too... So i have asked a techy to wire me a van der hul cable because I got hold of it for cheap and "just to try why not" kinda thing. So he did it...

The test is so simple man... Neve m88 2 mic;s and 2 cables me talking. CH1 warm audio cable CH2 van der hul cable... switching the mic's.

Warm audio cable 12 o clock position, and van der hul cable at 3 o clock position getting the same gain on the Ev ND457 mic

On the sm57 is pretty much the same but noise on the van der hul cable is higher, with the warm audio cable is super silent.

That is why i am puzzled...

 

[Studiogearlover]

There are definitely sonic differences between cables. A significant gain difference seems unusual though. Have you checked that the wiring is correct? Maybe you’d like to post some clips?

I believe so it is... although the van der hul cable is wired xlr to trs... but the Neve as a combi input for trs or xlr. I assume this would not make a difference if it is set for mic input

 

[john12ax7]

Cables do sound different. Compare Mogami 2549 vs 2534 vs Canare DA206 and you will hear a difference. It's low on the list of things to worry about, but is indeed there.

Cable construction will also impact noise, both external and handling noise.

However you should definitely not have 25% volume difference. That implies something is broken.

 

[Dylan W]

I believe so it is... although the van der hul cable is wired xlr to trs... but the Neve as a combi input for trs or xlr. I assume this would not make a difference if it is set for mic input

I wouldn’t assume that. It sounds like you’re losing level either through the signal getting unbalanced somewhere or different gain structure between the XLR and TRS. The different inputs could also be responsible for some of the sonic differences you’re hearing. Try getting a TRS to XLR adapter and run the test again.

 

[SubSpec]

I believe so it is... although the van der hul cable is wired xlr to trs... but the Neve as a combi input for trs or xlr. I assume this would not make a difference if it is set for mic input

Well, this seems like poor design on Neve's part (can't believe I just said that). Either they are using inconsistent messaging or the light may be fooling you into thinking it is following the mic level path when it is actually following the line level path.

 

[Studiogearlover]

I wouldn’t assume that. It sounds like you’re losing level either through the signal getting unbalanced somewhere or different gain structure between the XLR and TRS. The different inputs could also be responsible for some of the sonic differences you’re hearing. Try getting a TRS to XLR adapter and run the test again.

I understand. But the XLR to TRS is balanced...unless the neve neutrik combi xlr jack input is unbalanced, which I would be surprised about. I am not really having a tantrum here about cables, I could not care less but I had an opportunity to test this and I was always wanted to...so...just sharing my insight here and curious about yours...

 

[Studiogearlover]

Well, this seems like poor design on Neve's part (can't believe I just said that). Either they are using inconsistent messaging or the light may be fooling you into thinking it is following the mic level path when it is actually following the line level path.

View attachment 131778

I am with you.. i was really hoping that combi neutriks are balanced both TRS and XLR are going on the same path... but now you made me thinkin... i am going to write to them about this...

 

[Khron]

I understand. But the XLR to TRS is balanced

I'm sure it's balanced, but the XLR and TRS inputs are not hard-wired in parallel. If anything, it's more likely the TRS input just has a resistor divider (ie. attenuator) on each signal line, and then goes into a mic input, like most small-to-medium format mixers.

An apples vs. apples comparison would've been much more relevant (if not also more appropriate), as opposed to this apples vs. oranges. Not to mention, the mic input is likely sub-3k input impedance, while the line input should be 10k, if not more (see the spec sheet of the preamp).

 

[Khron]

Copied from the product page:

Preamp Specification

Microphone input impedance (balanced): 1.5k Ohms
...
Microphone input gain range: +21dB to 68dB
...
Line input impedance (balanced): 20k Ohms
...
Line input gain range: -12 to +35dB

"Of course" the XLR and TRS inputs are the same - look, the impedances and gain ranges are identical! Or actually... Hmmm, wait a minute...

-----

Snarkiness aside, solder an XLR connector in place of that TRS on the "custom made" cable and redo the test, even ignoring the non-double-blind nature of it, and come back to us, hmm?

Later edit: And that's not even touching on the tonal differences of various load impedances on a transformer-output microphone...

 

[Matt Syson]

A mic wired DIRECTLY to a transformer input will 'sound' different when it is connected via a PAD of any value because a transformer is a reactive load and a pad is resistive and even if the same transformer is used the mic/cable combination will react differently when it is loaded by either resistive or reactive loads and then you have the gain difference to contend with as the frequency response of a variable gain amplifier is NOT constant over the range of gain that is applied. Test equipment (oscilloscopes for example) use switches and each step has it's own compensation so that the bandwidth does remain constant.
Even mic amps that use switches rarely have extra facilities to keep the bandwidth constant, hence the ability to get different 'tone response' depending on gain setting. Cable LENGTH is also important where bulk capacitance between cores and screen will interact differently. Resistive sources and 'inputs' will have a relatively straightforward relation between length and frequency response, being a low pass filter but if a transformer is involed at either end all bets are off because they react with the cable capacitance. Whether something is unbalanced or not will have a very slight difference because of the different capacitances between the signal and 'ground' even when you consider the balanced case does not normally include ground but then 'Balanced' is only actually balanced over a limited bandwidth anyway. Your experiment included so many variable it is near impossible to form a conclusion other than you had a fun afternoon playing.

 

[MicMan]

The TRS jack socket is meant for 'hi-impedance' (high output) devices such as guitar pickups.
The XLR socket is meant for 'lo-impedance' (and low output) devices such as microphones.

It seems that you are using - with the TRS jack on the end of your Van de Hul cable - your MIC plugged into the LINE IN capability, as you're engaging the 'Line' switch to enable that TRS jack socket.

You're thus putting a LOW-level signal, from your mic, into a socket (the TRS 'Line'-level socket) which expects a HIGH signal level ..but as your mic is delivering a low-level signal, you're having to turn up the gain, and the audio sounds wrong. This is normal when you plug a MIC into a LINE (TRS) socket. (And vice versa, too: that'll sound wrong.)

Solder an XLR plug (Pin 1 is Earth/Ground, Pin 2 is Live, + or 'Hot', Pin 3 is 'neutral' or 'return', - [negative] or 'Cold') onto the Van de Hul cable, instead of the TRS jack, and all will work correctly.

 

[Studiogearlover]

Thanks guys, i thought if i engage the "mic" input switch on the Neve, i could use either the xlr or trs as it is a combi socket with low imp mic's .... So this experiment is over i was wrong...

,i understand what you guys are saying above and thank you all for your input.

 

[Khron]

i thought if i engage the "mic" input switch on the Neve, i could use either the xlr or trs as it is a combi socket with low imp mic's

Well, it's all right there on page 10 of the manual...

Connect your microphone to the 88M using an XLR cable into the combi XLR port

Connect your line-level instruments to the 88M with a ¼" jack cable into the combi TRS port. The 88M accepts balanced TRS or unbalanced TS line inputs

Although, to be fair, without reverse-engineering the input section & associated switching circuitry, it's difficult to say exactly how and what is really going on in there.

Point being, the comparison you did was indeed apples vs. oranges.