Patchbay: balanced and unbalanced connections

[Gregory K]

Dear forum members,

I'm currently planning my patchbay - and I have to deal with various connections, including unbalanced to balanced and balanced to unbalanced.

I'm going to follow the Rane interconnection schemes described here:
http://www.rane.com/note110.html

My question is: What if I connect all devices to (a rear of) the patchbay using cables with a direct standard wiring (TRS-TRS for balanced equipment and TS-TS for unbalanced equipment) and then make all balanced/unbalanced "conversions" between these devices by using custom patch cords, wired accordingly to the Rane article?

In other words, I consider the patchbay sockets as a "direct replication" of devices' sockets. And the patch cords - as cables, connecting these devices.

Does it look like a correctly working solution or am I missing something?

P.S. In this case, the patchbay have to be in a through mode (de-normalled) and I will need a good amount of various custom patch cords, but that's fine to me.

Thank you,
Gregory

 

[Biasrocks]

Seems like an opportunity for lot's of headaches.

I made all my connections on the patch bay balanced and dealt with the various differences at the equipment I/O end.

Much easier and no special patch cables needed.

Regards,
Mark

 

[Gregory K]

Thank you for your reply, Mark!

I will do the same.

 

[saxmonster]

What patch bay will you be using?  Will you be making your own cables?  Im in the same boat and this summer i am gonna make my patch bay  with a behringer one and make my own cables to connect everything.

-Scott

 

[Gregory K]

Sorry for late reply, Scott.

I was going to use my DBX PB48 patch bay (TRS), which has been sitting in a rack for several years (I barely used it). I don't have any soldering skills, so I usually draw wiring schemes and go to a company, who can deal with commutation.

However, I decided not to use DBX PB48 patch bay, because after A/B listening tests, I've found out that the patch ruined the sound. It was especially obvious on low end and highs. I'm not sure if this is the case with my particular unit or with all DBXs PB48.

So far, I connected everything directly to the console, though I currently can't use Direct Outs for recording - I use Subgroups outs for now...

I've heard an opinion that it's better not to use TRS patch bays at all. And if you need a patch bay, you should obtain a patch bay, which requires wiring or a patch bay with pushing terminals. (And I'm sure that such patch bays are the best choice).

And I've also heard that Samson S-Patch Plus is the only TRS patch bay which is much closer to 'wiring patch bays' than any other TRS patch bay, in terms of durability and overall quality. However, I haven't tested it myself.

Gregory