I bought lots of stuff over 50 years of messing around with stereos and that includes some RCA plugs never used. So, for less than $9 for more than enough shielded Cat5e to make 10f foot ICs with my RCAs plugs seems money well spent. Using something like Belden 8402 would cost over $100.
Holy time warp Batman, takes me back almost 2 decades to Chris VenHaus’ numerous DIY snake oil recipes with CAT5, et al (oops, did I say the quiet part out loud😵 ?). One of his brainstorms for speaker wire was to braid 3 or more runs of CAT5, then meticulously separate the solid colours from stripes and terminate with either spades or banana plugs. Not so “Super easy, barely an inconvenience”.
Seriously, though, I guess I was lucky not having any particular problem with hum/noise pickup with the few interconnects I made - none were over 2m, IIRC. As Jeff alluded, the biggest pain in the adze was stripping the jacket and separating the four twisted pairs. Could I categorically attest to vast improvement over store bought cabling, or home made with more conventional materials - sorry, but no.
Was fun to futz around, though.
Seriously, though, I guess I was lucky not having any particular problem with hum/noise pickup with the few interconnects I made - none were over 2m, IIRC. As Jeff alluded, the biggest pain in the adze was stripping the jacket and separating the four twisted pairs. Could I categorically attest to vast improvement over store bought cabling, or home made with more conventional materials - sorry, but no.
Was fun to futz around, though.
The following got me interested in using Cat5 + its cheap.
In professional broadcast facilities there is no longer much "audio cable" used at all. It's all Cat5 in one form or other, and mostly not shielded, because it's all well balanced lines. The bridge between RJ45 and audio connectors is handled easily with these. "StudioHub" is an industry-wide accepted standard, and most major broadcast audio equipment manufacturers are now using RJ45 jacks for audio connections.
In professional broadcast facilities there is no longer much "audio cable" used at all. It's all Cat5 in one form or other, and mostly not shielded, because it's all well balanced lines. The bridge between RJ45 and audio connectors is handled easily with these. "StudioHub" is an industry-wide accepted standard, and most major broadcast audio equipment manufacturers are now using RJ45 jacks for audio connections.
The typical Cat 5 cable has 4 pairs of wires when wired for ethernet and phone, a transmit pair on pins 1+2, a receive pair on pins 3+6, a pair for phone on pins 4+5(tip and ring), and a spare pair on pins 7+8. If you cut a cable apart you see the pairs, 3 of the pairs in a transparent colored insulation which I think is Teflon type material, and the last pair for phone in a cheaper insulation. I have thrown miles of UTP cable in drop ceiling wiring up businesses in my youth and terminating at the wall and testing the connections. I had a partial roll of cable left over and use some of the teflon pairs for internal wiring in my preamp. It is inexpensive and with the teflon coating doesn't hurt the signal.
SInce Cat5e has 4 pairs and spec.s say its shielding reduces EMI and crosstalk, I'm thinking of using one 10 foot length and connecting two RCAs on each end. So, two RCA ICs with one cable. Any thoughts on this?
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There is no shielding in a true Cat5 cable, the twisting of the wires in pairs tends to cancel noise in a differential send and receive pair.
That said, the cable is cheap enough to experiment with. Make up a set of cables and carefully route them at the equipment and see what happens. I don't know about putting two active analog signals side by side in a single cable though. Have fun, and learn, that's what DIY is all about.
That said, the cable is cheap enough to experiment with. Make up a set of cables and carefully route them at the equipment and see what happens. I don't know about putting two active analog signals side by side in a single cable though. Have fun, and learn, that's what DIY is all about.
Those specs apply mostly to balanced lines.
The biggest concern with RCA unbalanced interconnects is: Common Impedance Coupling noise (power line related noise).
Nothing in a CAT cable will help there. Coax is much, much better withpower line related noise
The biggest concern with RCA unbalanced interconnects is: Common Impedance Coupling noise (power line related noise).
Nothing in a CAT cable will help there. Coax is much, much better withpower line related noise
CAT cable is available as Unshielded Twisted Pair and as Shielded Twisted Pair.
But the shielding is optimized for high radio frequencies. Not as effective at audio frequencies as braid.
But the shielding is optimized for high radio frequencies. Not as effective at audio frequencies as braid.
I understand that the aluminum foil doesn't have the shielding properties as braided, which I think is like a Fraday cage. What are the benefits of AL foil?
Aluminum foil has good shielding properties at high radio frequencies.
Braid has good shielding properties at low frequencies.
They are both about equal at maybe 10 megahertz.
But most of the noise problems in an audio circuit are well below 1 megahertz, so braid is better.
Braid has good shielding properties at low frequencies.
They are both about equal at maybe 10 megahertz.
But most of the noise problems in an audio circuit are well below 1 megahertz, so braid is better.