XLR or single ended cables and why?

Well, the concept of noise reduction is the basic theme of XLR/balanced cable, and that point is the "take away" regardless of how badly anyone messes up the explanation of how it is achieved. At least, that's my approach as an end user. If I owned equipment that was all truly balanced, I'm certain I'd use balanced cabling. However, as it stands, I use all single ended cabling, and I have absolutely no issues with noise due to the RCA interconnects.

It is a different situation if the grounds are electrically seperated. Such is the case with a true dual-mono implementations or monoblock amplifiers, if they don't share grounds with an external ground wire or through the AC ground

In the case of mono amps with single ended inputs they will share the same circuit ground, they are connected together at the single ended source, ie. pre-amp.

steve

Shadorne, Is it a big deal to have an extra increase of 6db with XLR ? That's a lot of extra juice. Running either at 4 or 8 ohm, It requires double in wattage power for each 3db increase. Isn't it ? BTW, I have my MD. pulled the wool out of my ears the other day. Thanks for the advise.

Andrewdoan,

No there is very little current and almost no power flowing through interconnects...input impedances of devices they connect to are normally pretty high.

All a high signal level means is that if there is noise being picked up or if there is noise in the preceeding circuit then the Signal to Noise might be less by about 6db or so compared to RCA (which has a lower signal level). This is in "Theory", however, in practice RCA circuits can be just as good S/N as compared to XLR balanced....I guess it depends on the individual component circuit quality as much as anything. In any case, once you get to S/N of 110+ db which is often the case in high quality gear ...it becomes academic if it is RCA or XLR as you can only hear the noise with no other sound from the speakers and the volume cranked up and your ear at 6 inches from the tweeter!!!

Of course, the above comments are for short runs and for a normal environment where you don't have a problem with EM noise pick up (lots of cables/transformers etc. all close together).

rats:[Quote]In the case of mono amps with single ended inputs they will share the same circuit ground, they are connected together at the single ended source, ie. pre-amp.[Quote]Steve, you missed the point. The right channel circuit will contain only the right channel interconnect and right channel amplifier. The current in the ground wire of the right channel interconnect will be equal in magnitude to the current in the right channel positive wire of the same interconnect, just in opposite phase. The same would be true for the left channel, so the electrical balance condition is maintained, just like in fully-balanced systems.

The question here isn't whether Andrewdoan should buy components with balanced circuits, since he already owns them. Anyway, in home audio this choice is rarely about reducing overt noise levels. For a combination of reasons -- running true-balanced is capable of reducing not only induced noise, but also self-generated noise, and in some cases distortion too -- the pertinent point is that the sound of the music might be improved by using balanced connections when running balanced gear, even if you never hear the result as being 'noise-reduction' per se. One of those reasons is that internally-balanced gear typically subjects unbalanced input signals to an additional circuit stage in order to convert them to balanced for processing, and this extra input stage is bypassed when using a balanced connection. (Conversely, gear that isn't internally balanced, but merely has XLR jacks wired in series with its RCA jacks for the sake of convenience, will often sound better with single-ended connections, which dispense with the extra jacks, wiring and solder joints at this small-signal juncture). So the answer to the question at the top is that there is no one right answer, it depends on the gear -- and with gear that was designed to make full use of a balanced connection, it makes sense to try one.