About a year ago I had a phone conversation with a tech from Studio 1 Productions, a company which competes with Beachtek. I prefer their adapters to Beachteks because they clip on your belt instead of attaching to the camera. They make several models of XLR to mini-jack adapters, and some of these use transformers and some just make the connection directly. I was asking the tech how the transformer and transformerless devices compared. He told me that it really depended upon what you wanted to connect and how long your cable runs were. According to him, the transformers they used were the quietest available, but that they were still an extra piece added to the audio chain. If you were running cable lengths less than 50 feet and didn't need line level inputs, the transformerless design was as good or better than the transformer model.

Here is a link to their transformerless model:
http://www.studio1productions.com/xlr-bp.htm

Here is a link to the model with a transformer:
http://www.studio1productions.com/xlr-bp_pro.htm

I bought the second model, but as you can see, the advantage is mainly the extra versatility of line/mic inputs and the ground lift for getting rid of hum in direct mixer connections.

Rednroll: "Sorry, I must have misinterpreted [Coursedesign's] statement then:
"I have to agree with Bob's statement that balanced isn't necessarily better, and for the exact reason he gives."

I guess so. "Balanced isn't necessarily better" means that a good unbalanced design can sound better than a poor balanced design. Make sense? This is not religion, with "My God is bigger than yours," it's just about having options as a designer.

Balanced has a couple of applications where it is really needed. In other cases unbalanced may be a way to provide better sound at a lower cost (because of the usually lower parts count).

Can we switch this silly post-holiday discussion now?

All who need to relax, get some Stone Brewery India Pale Ale. This is IMHO the finest ale in the world right now, and it's available in Whole Foods health food stores, so you have no excuses anymore :O). It may also be available overseas, at least in the UK.

All who need to wake up, get some Peet's Coffee "101 Blend" (named after the freeway?) or Starbucks "Caffe Verona". These two both do the job amicably, and life is good.

"I guess so. "Balanced isn't necessarily better" means that a good unbalanced design can sound better than a poor balanced design. Make sense?"

Well yeah, no kidding. I could say a similar thing and make a statement like "HD video isn't necessarily better than SD video" because the HD design didn't keep the video in HD resolution throughout it's signal path and actually ran the signal through a couple lousy MPeg1 low bit/rate encodes a couple times before it ever reached the final HD viewing screen, so why purchase HD video equipment when I can get better video viewing with this SD video that used a more prestine encoding hi-res encoding path? I guess you made one heck of a statement there.

If an unbalanced system design can really be made to sound better than a balanced system design, I'll be sure to pass your information along to the rest of the guys in charge of our Mark Levinson amplifier design department and ask them why they insist on using balanced circuit designs to maintain that the Mark Levinson equipment is the best in class. These guys even pick the type of material the PCB is made of to maintain the best audio signal reproduction.

Check it out for yourself, you many learn a few things.
http://www.marklevinson.com/press/details.asp?cat=&prod=&press=23

I learned quite a few things from Mark Levinson.

He came to my home to make sure that my music and film system was set up correctly, then we spent the rest of the evening talking shop. He is quite a guy.

I have my HDTV tuner hooked up to both an SD TV and a 105" HD TV. Indeed, some content looks better on the SD TV, because it's early days and many (most, really) of the broadcasters don't seem to have any serious video engineers working on their HDTV broadcasts. They didn't even need MPEG-1 to screw it up. Worst is when the audio is well behind the picture, not pleasant to watch.

I'm familliar with a lot of high end equipment, and have heard perhaps 80-90% of it. I rejected about 98% of it for actually not sounding good, even the $85,000 speakers etc. Hearing is believing. I also spent many years designing very high quality amplifiers, and one computer-designed speaker enclosure with an unusual crossover filter that really sounded good.

I think I can safely guarantee that there isn't one ML engineer who will say that any balanced stage will sound better than any unbalanced stage. That's the simple truth, and any design engineer can confirm that.

Read my statement as you quoted it at the beginning of your post. Isn't that exactly what I said?

"I learned quite a few things from Mark Levinson."

You didn't happen to read his book did ya? :-)

"I think I can safely guarantee that there isn't one ML engineer who will say that any balanced stage will sound better than any unbalanced stage."

Why did you change the subject or are you trying to imply something I didn't say? Aren't we talking about a balanced vs an unbalanced system design and not a single stage? I know in a perfect world all audio system amplifier designs would have 0% THD+N with an infinite gain using only a single unbalanced opamp. Excellent, go design that for me. Oh yeah and BTW I am a ML design engineer for the Mark Levinson systems being put into Lexus vehicles.

Ha-ha, very funny about his book. I looked through his book at B&N and thought it looked a bit like an engineering manual, so I decided to stick with my past experience. :O)

No, I just spent real time with Mark.

A system to me consists of a series of stages. No distinction in this case.

I haven't been a friend of opamps for audio, but there are definitely good designs nowadays, after designers gained a better understanding of dynamic behavior.

In my own design work, I have been more of a minimalist. I like low gain stages with maximum sound quality before the modest feedback that is of course necessary.

Still, I have been very pleasantly surprised with some automotive audio systems that just sounded damn pleasant.

I had an over-the-top system in one of my cars in the 1980s, and it sounded incredible, but I have also been in rental cars that had very simple equipment and it sounded very pleasant, at a modest cost. Now that's a skill.

The Lexus sound system components are certainly really well matched, and that's what makes for the overall great sound (the pieces working well together). So be proud of that!

Okay - I may have gotten confused between which are the good and bad harmonics - I looked up in google -- it looks like there's some disagreement between which is which ....anyway... My point is that it really doesn't matter as far as specifics of which is better, 'cause you'll always find someone else who disagrees. Unbalanced is fine unless you have an interference problem. Balanced is fine unless you can hear preamp noise... (Geez!)

The real problem I have with all of this is that by far, most people producing video have no idea how to produce decent audio, or else don't care! I can't tell you how many times people have had me over to their post facility to record narration for "bigtime" network productions or commercials -- we're doing it in the edit bay! -- No acoustics - machines whirring in the background, and we're using a lavelier taped to a C stand!

I often recommend that we take projects to "Real" audio studios for narration recording and sweeting. But someone always wants to save a few bucks or minutes. They're paying me good money to do their narration, and in the end it sounds like garbage 'cause they don't take decent care. They oughta' hire a high school student to read their copy... and use the money they save to hire a decent audio facility!

Grumble....

Travis
Voice & Narration Services - www.Narrate.biz

I have a Panasonic GS400. I'm going to experiment this weekend with the new gear and see how it performs. I'll report back to see if the unbalanced will work when I stick it in the 1/8" jack.

Red,
I don't know how the discussion ended up talking about 'system' design. I'll take your word on the benefits of balanced versus unbalanced ciruits, it's a LONG time since I looked into that (like 30 years) and back then it was pretty problematic, I sure don't recall many valve designs that were balanced all the way through.
But either way most of what video guys have to deal with is already existing equipment. By that I mean cameras and VCRs. Now I don't know if their internal audio circuits are balanced or not, I'd seriously doubt it judging by their pretty horrid performance, just try out the venerable PD150 /170. With these cameras you'd think, like most things, you should get better performance switching the AGC off, well wrong, the noise floor comes up something horrid. Damned if I know why.
Now how does this camera handle the balanced audio inputs, well it's got a set of balanced to unbalaced converters in the handle where the mics connect, then it runs unbalanced, unshielded through a length of flexible PCB past the motor drive circuits, no wonder it's so damn noisy.
Now take the Panasonic DVC30, you can, as an optional extra, add balanced audio inputs. But this is just a bolt on box with an unbalanced interconnect to the camera.
I've opened up some other kit that's used in the video world. Yeah, you get a choice of balanced or unbalanced, what's the difference, a $1 transformer between an RCA socket and an XLR socket, now in that scenario which CONNECTION method is going to give you the best possible sound?
Despite that in any field situation I always advise people to go with balanced connections, nothing to do with the esoteric question of circuit design. It's as pragmatic as XLR connectors mechanically locked. The difference can be between having any audio and none. Yes I've had more than one client whose had this happen, minipin plug popped out of the camera and they didn't notice.
Bob.

"Yes I've had more than one client whose had this happen, minipin plug popped out of the camera and they didn't notice."
Many miniplugs can also be noisy if you bump the cord. I would take
a good ol gold plated XLR any day.

I've seen topics take an OT life of their own, but this one is getting a bit silly. The original poster is talking about a few inches from the receiver to the camera, so either balanced or unbalanced will sound exactly the same.

However, given the choice of a 1/8" mini-plug and XLR connectors, I'll take the more secure, more robust XLR's any day.

Steve