Can't resist making a late reply to this question, :-) Star quad is
only "super balanced" cable wired so that the ground is symmetrical
with the + and - conductors. Stereo needs more separation and the
alternative is two pair, individualy screened which is at least twice
the cost as two single pair screened. The other problem is making the
Y at each end which is a source of failure.
I've got a total of 800 metres of cable (half a mile) which is the
cheapest foil screened I could buy and I've deployed up to 250 metres
twice (for stereo) with no audible loss of quality or level. I'm
running floating balanced low impedance mics into balanced inputs. The
cheapest cable drums were using garden hose reels and discarding the
hose. (=A317 from B&Q)
The only trouble I have had is when I connected some of the XLR shells
and got a hum loop when the far end got grounded. There's a mains
voltage difference across the ground for some reason, possibly from
the HT supply line and transformer grounding. I've never had
interferenece problems with unconnected XLR shells, so it was a silly
thing to do to connect them.
David
David Brinicombe
North Devon, UK
Cogito cogito ergo cogito sum - Ambrose Bierce
|