Topic: Cheap audio snake

[taper420]

http://froogle.google.com/froogle_cluster?q=trs+gold+connectors&pid=4912350166007185101&oid=15000422813082103538&btnG=Search+Froogle&scoring=mrd&hl=en

This has got to sound like crap right? It seems like the gold connectors are just the icing on a crap cake. Would I be doing serious audio degradation to put this in my chain?

[cshepherd]

That would be my assumption.  At that price, you're paying for the termination labor.  The cable itself probably cost pennies.  And the terminations are probably dodgy at best.

~crackpot

[TNJazz]

Hmmm.  It is cheap, but I don't know.  HOSA snakes are only a couple of bucks more and they're not so bad.  Certainly not up to the task of constant long term use, but I have a couple and they've worked fine for the odd gig in the past 2 years...so who knows?  These might not be all that bad.

[taper420]

http://froogle.google.com/froogle_cluster?q=hosa+snake+female+xlr+trs&pid=2330809963545222189&oid=14021511233941570678&btnG=Search+Froogle&scoring=mrd&hl=en

The Hosa's are twice the price for half the length. Pricewise that means they're about three times "better". Ah, but no gold contacts....knocks em down to twice as good.....

No matter, I'm going for some canare quads.... don't wanna fvck around.
Can anyone recommend a brand and place to get a good deal on gold TRS connectors? I'll need a bunch.....this whole thing started cause I was looking for connectors and that entire snake with gold connectors is cheaper than the connectors I'm looking at

[cshepherd]

The Whirlwind Medusa is the standard for pro audio snakes.

~crackpot

[balou2]

~crackpot

[insert spoon, and stir]
+t Chris

[ghellquist]

In the real world there is no difference between gold and silver XLR contacts as for transmitting sound. Millions of XLR silver plated XLR connectors are used throughout the world. Or to put it differently, the best thing about gold in these applications is that it looks good with black.

Low priced snakes can work quite well, but the can also have all sorts of problems. Generally quality pays off in longevity and ability to stand abuse. Any time your most important mic input is disturbed by crackles from a bad solder joint in your low quality snake, you are going to hate yourself for beeing cheap. But going for quality is not necessarily the same as paying extra for things like gold plating.

Gunnar