Insane idea #142

on the back of my dax there are 2 'pre-out's'. now i was wondering if it would be worth trying to 'biwire' these into the single xlr that my amp uses as it's input. i was thinking of mixing cable types. knowing sweet f.a. about electricity and all that guff - except that 'shorts are bad' i have to ask the question 'will my amp (or dac) be fubar if i try this?
cheers

julian.

 

Ju,

A definate No-no sir

 

Not sure why you'd want to anyway? If you really wanted to mix cable types (and again, not sure why you'd want to) you could do that on a single plug, assuming it'd all fit inside.

 

An XLR is a balanced input. It has a non-inverting, an inverting, and a ground connection. You can drive only 1 input - either inverting or non-inverting with an unbalanced [phono] lineout. You need to make the ground connection between dac and XLR. The other is left untouched, although in some applications it is better connected to earth. I do this on my bass processor. It means the unit will clip 6dB lower than a balanced drive, and only the cable screening avoids hum. Otherwise it works OK. Driving both with the same input [either from 2 pre-outs or just paired from the same line source] will not work.

http://www.dself.dsl.pipex.com/ampins/balanced/balanced.htm#XLRphono

 

If you invert one of the pre-outs then yes I think you could make a single balanced XLR from it.