XLR Patchbay?

mingus2112 · Post by **mingus2112** » Fri Feb 03, 2006 11:17 am

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/MXL369

Anybody know anything about these? I was having a friend build me an XLR patch panel, but i don't think i have much chance of ever seeing that. He's always too busy. Anything with "normaled" or whatever scares me. . .because quite frankly i have no idea what it means. Never took the time to sit down and understand that.

If I go out and get a studio full of Mogami cable (running Monster cable right now), is using this Hosa XLR patch panel going to screw me? I think I know the answer already. Does anyone know where one could BUY a patch panel? Femal XLRs across the front with 2' - 3' wire hanging out of the back with Male XLRs on the ends to connect to my preamps. Is that too mutch to ask?

-James

digitaldrummer · Post by **digitaldrummer** » Fri Feb 03, 2006 1:01 pm

you might try Redco (www.redco.com) I think they do custom stuff. I have the other Hosa patchbay (non-modular) with 12 XLR's. the length of cable from front to back is so short I surely don't notice a difference. I have some homemade Mogami cables, and some crap too.

Mike

Rodgre · Post by **Rodgre** » Fri Feb 03, 2006 2:12 pm

Hosa makes one. I use them all the time.

http://www.hosatech.com/hosa/products/PDR-369.html

Roger

Professor · Post by **Professor** » Fri Feb 03, 2006 2:25 pm

Color me confused, but that doesn't look like a 12-point patchbay and neither does it look like there's a swtich to adjust balanced and/or normalled operations. I think Sweetwater just put up the wrong description.

I imagine that is just an XLR on the front and the rear wired straight through and meant to be used on the front of a rack so you don't have to crawl around behind your gear to plug in mics. So you buy that or their 12-point model and a bunch of short XLRs to get from the back of your preamps to the front of your rack.

James, if you're not itching to do your own soldering, that may be a good bet for you - well either that or the 12-point version mentioned.
As for a rack panel fitted with a dozen XLRs, about 3' of cable each, and another dozen XLRs, well that's just not going to be a stock product anywhere. So you have your choice of building your own or having one custom built by Redco, Proco, Rapco, Audio Accessories, or any number of other companies. Hell you could probably convince someone on the board here to build you one for $20 plus the cost of parts.
I personally have built a lot of these sorts of custom panels for racks around the school. I typically use the Middle Atlantic UNI-1-C panel which has 20 laser-cut punchouts. You knock out as many as you need and they fit the typical Neutrik or Switchcraft XLRs as well as any Neutrik D-type chassis-mount connector. On the back side I wire up the length of cable I need directly to the connector on the front panel, and then down to the piece of gear in the rack. Canare Wire & Cable also builds really nice panels that are heavy-duty, numbered, use tapped screw holes instead of nuts & bolts, but they are very spendy as well.
But before you try to build your own, or order one custom, make sure to really measure the lengths you'll need on those cables. Three feet is plenty long enough for a couple shallow-depth units that are only a couple spaces away, but if you have a deep unit that is 6, 8, or 10 spaces away, then you'll probably need more. Nothing worse then shelling out money for a custom cable and finding out it doesn't reach or is stretched like a tight-rope.

-Jeremy

brianb · Post by **brianb** » Fri Feb 03, 2006 4:20 pm

Coincidentally I ordered one of these from Seetwater earlier this week. I just got a dbx pb-48 patchbay and I don't need 12 channels of xlr ins so this was a perfect solution for me.

All I needed was something to make the back of the three preamps I'm currently using accessible like the Professor was saying.

I've got the preamp out normaled to my DAW which makes it easy to insert eq compression etc.

I was also confused about the whole normaled thing until I read the great little manual that comes with the dbx. You can download it here at the bottom of the page.

I'm not expecting any problems using the xlr patchbay but I'll post again after I get it if I do. (By the way no one seems to have them in stock. Sweet water said they'd have em to ship on 2/20.)

Hope this helps.

Brian

Professor · Post by **Professor** » Fri Feb 03, 2006 5:30 pm

Oh yeah, the normalling thing.
Well unless I've missed something, I don't think I've ever seen a normalling XLR connector. Quarter-inch and TT jacks can be built so they are normalling connections, and Canare builds video jacks that normal though that might be for King jacks only.
And normalling isn't that hard to understand. It has to do with the top and bottom rows of a patchbay - are they "normally" connected even when a cable isn't plugged in. If so, then plugging in a patch cord breaks the 'normal' connection of output on the top row to input on the bottom.
There a very good explanaition on the Audio Accessories website.

-Jeremy

digitaldrummer · Post by **digitaldrummer** » Fri Feb 03, 2006 9:22 pm

the Hosa PDR-369 (if you can still get it) is the 12-point patchbay and, yes, I also use it only so I don't have to crawl behind my rack (most of the time). it is simply XLRF to XLRM pass-through. got mine brand new on eBay for about $90 (shipped). love it.

Professor · Post by **Professor** » Sat Feb 04, 2006 1:55 am

It says the PDR-369 is "reversible", which certainly makes sense. But is it reversible "per channel" or is it only possible to spin the whole thing around?
It looks like the connectors are attached with screws rather than pop-rivets so maybe I answered my own question.

Seems it would be nice to grab the input and output of each device on the same patch panel, unless you also have a regular patchbay oro run the preamp outputs directly to a recorder.

-Jeremy

workshed · Post by **workshed** » Sat Feb 04, 2006 1:47 pm

I've been researching these too, and it seems to me that by the time you buy all the parts to build one, you're spending as much or more than you would on the hosa 12-point rack. Of course, this was figuring the same config as the hosa, but 16 point with two TRS and two TS jacks as well (to run the matching jacks from my stage snake to my 1/4" patchbay). I may still make my own to have more flexibility. Probably worth it to spend $40 more and spend a little time on it to get what I really want. Although the Hosa one is enticing, keep in mind you will need to spend some extra cash to get the short XLR patch cables to run from the back to your pres.

Edit: I also found this one on B&H, although it does not have jacks in back:

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/control ... ype=search

-Bret

supafuzz · Post by **supafuzz** » Sat Feb 04, 2006 1:55 pm

i HAVE 3 OF the pdr 369 with 12 xlr pairs AND THEY'RE GREAT

You can unscrew them and flip them around really easily.....

so mine is set up in-out/ in-out/etc

they sound fine and have never given me any problems
definately cheaper than buying parts and spending plusl that time

workshed · Post by **workshed** » Sat Feb 04, 2006 2:00 pm

Hey Harley, how hard would it be to rewire one of the xlr jacks with a trs jack? Are the chassis punchouts pretty universally sized?

supafuzz wrote:i HAVE 3 OF the pdr 369 with 12 xlr pairs AND THEY'RE GREAT

You can unscrew them and flip them around really easily.....

so mine is set up in-out/ in-out/etc

they sound fine and have never given me any problems
definately cheaper than buying parts and spending plusl that time

supafuzz · Post by **supafuzz** » Sat Feb 04, 2006 2:14 pm

I guess not hard at all
if you have a plate that fits

Professor · Post by **Professor** » Sat Feb 04, 2006 8:23 pm

The punchouts look like the standard size for any Neutrik d-type connector. (And I know those pretty well.) Neutrik builds at least one model of nearly all of their connectors in that size, from XLR (all pin counts) to 1/4", combo jacks, SpeakOn, PowerCon, EtherCon, BNC, RCA, pretty much all of 'em. Not that I imagine anyone replacing an EtherCon to go from RJ-45 to XLR.

-Jeremy

mingus2112 · Post by **mingus2112** » Mon Feb 06, 2006 7:10 am

Thanks for all of the replies guys. What about the cable quality inside? I'd hate to have 3" of cable inside that defeats the purpose of me buying Mogami. Does that make any sense? Or am I just nit-picking?

-James

supafuzz · Post by **supafuzz** » Mon Feb 06, 2006 7:13 am

YES YOU ARE!

ENJOY LIFE RECORD MORE MUSIC!

Don't sweat that little bit of wire
it's not going to make any difference

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