need a solution (patchbay-r)
dj_cityboy
1,478 Posts
hey guys/gals i need some help looking for a solution, i think i found what i need but i am not sure.
i need to route audio to a few devices (not at once) but individually for recording purposes, i have a Cassette/DAT/MPC/PC/Sampler and some other gear i would like to use, currently i am stuck plugging in/unpluggin cables and its starting to be a bit of a pain, i was researching a patchbay and that "seemed" to be the solution that i needed, but i called my local Music Shop (Long & McQuade) and the folks in the recording Dept were busy but they guy who answered the phone said he might be able to help me out i told him what i was looking to do and he told me a patchbay wasnt going to fix my issue at all and that i would be wasting my money.
basically i would like to route my audio outs from the back of my Mackie to any device i want to record too at the time, from what i understood (unless i read incorrectly) i could plug inputs from my devices into the back of the patchbay outputs:
Cassette into output 1
Dat into output 2
MPC into output 3
PC into output 4
Sampler into output 5
and run my outs from my Mackie into 3 if i wanted to record to my MPC or 1 if i wanted to record to Cassette...via a patch cable
patchbay YAY or NAY? or any ideas as too what i need to make this happen?
thanks!
i need to route audio to a few devices (not at once) but individually for recording purposes, i have a Cassette/DAT/MPC/PC/Sampler and some other gear i would like to use, currently i am stuck plugging in/unpluggin cables and its starting to be a bit of a pain, i was researching a patchbay and that "seemed" to be the solution that i needed, but i called my local Music Shop (Long & McQuade) and the folks in the recording Dept were busy but they guy who answered the phone said he might be able to help me out i told him what i was looking to do and he told me a patchbay wasnt going to fix my issue at all and that i would be wasting my money.
basically i would like to route my audio outs from the back of my Mackie to any device i want to record too at the time, from what i understood (unless i read incorrectly) i could plug inputs from my devices into the back of the patchbay outputs:
Cassette into output 1
Dat into output 2
MPC into output 3
PC into output 4
Sampler into output 5
and run my outs from my Mackie into 3 if i wanted to record to my MPC or 1 if i wanted to record to Cassette...via a patch cable
patchbay YAY or NAY? or any ideas as too what i need to make this happen?
thanks!
Comments
In all real analog studios well thought out patchbays are the heart of the studio. For your purposes I would recommend the Sampson s-patch (I think that's what its called iirc) for two important reasons:
1) the jacks are TRS as opposed to TT. I use TT but it's 20x more expensive for patch cables and interfacing and is overkill for your situation. On the back are TRS jacks as well so you can run TRS to XLR, RCA, etc, just make sure you don't run a balanced output into an inbalanced input, ring and sleeve will short and your shield/chassis/ground noise will be introduced to the signal.
2) the Sampson has a small rocker switch for normalled/half normalled/isolated connection for every channel IIRC. You can save yourself slot of time and cables by running your most common setup normalled. Meaning if your output from your mixer most often goes into your mpc input, then put left and right vertically together and normal them, the audio will waterfall down unless you break the connection with a patch cable. In a Half normal situation you can even y split the signal (asuning there isn't an impedance mismatch).
Hose patchcables are perfectly fine for that Sampson.
Sorry for typos, im on iPhone in airport and writing from memory.
Standard spacing would be outputs on the top, inputs on the bottom. It makes things simpler when patching gets complicated. I use excell or a label printer to mark what is where on the patchbay. Good luck!