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Shielded Twisted Pair (STP) RCA cables for unbalanced differential-circuit analog input

QuantumBass

QuantumBass

New Member
I'm hoping to get a little advice, and maybe a product recommendation, for a roughly 15' 4-channel Shielded Twisted Pair (STP) RCA cable (or cables...) to use with the differential-circuit equipped multi-channel input of my Anthem Statement d2v 3D. There don't seem to be a lot of clear audiophile solutions, though maybe I'm not looking in the right places?

I've wound up looking at car audio solutions such as the Stinger SI8417 (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006AF7HY6), but their 3 conductor design has the description "These 3-conductor cables (per channel) are designed to reject noise and pull noise away from the the next device. To visualize, we only connect the 3rd (drain) conductor to the source side and the 2 signal conductors at the end component, keeping the noise from transferring to the next component" Which I'm not sure what the impact would be positive or negative on a differential circuit for this scenario. The source is a Sansui QRX-9001's tape-outs which is older and thus has ungrounded mains which apparently can introduce noise to its ground. I'd love to hear if anyone has any opinions on how the source having ungrounded mains might impact this decision. Most of my info has come from (https://www.epanorama.net/blog/2013/04/06/twisted-pair-rca-cables-again/).

Does anyone have any recommendations for more audiophile focused STP RCA cables?
 
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I'm confused by your request. Your Anthem uses XLR connectors for differential signals. Why are you looking at RCA cables? RCA plugs are only two conductors. There are plenty of sources for XLR cables, either audiophile or professional.
 
swechsler said:
I'm confused by your request. Your Anthem uses XLR connectors for differential signals. Why are you looking at RCA cables? RCA plugs are only two conductors. There are plenty of sources for XLR cables, either audiophile or professional.
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Here (https://www.avsforum.com/posts/15546653/), Bob Pariseau mentions upgrades compared to the 50v including differential circuits on the 6 channel input which is an rca multi channel input, thus an unbalanced differential circuit. It’s obviously not quite as effective as balanced, but seeing as my source is rca I’m hoping to take as much advantage of this for my 15’ run as possible. Hopefully that clarifies things a bit.
 
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My guess is that the circuit is converted to balanced inside the unit. To my understanding, differential and balanced are same thing. At any rate, the main advantage of a balanced signal is noise rejection; it's not like it's carrying higher quality audio. My suggestion would be to try a high quality (i.e. one with heavy shielding) RCA cable and I think you'll be fine.
 
I have 15' or longer RCA cables to connect preamp to amp. They work fine and no noise that I can hear. You are feeding your high dollar Anthem surround sound pre from a vintage Sansui receiver tape outs. I highly doubt some fancy RCA cable will make any audible difference.
 
Here's an article from BJC that I think speaks to what QuantumBass is alluding to about using STP cable in what some call a "quasi-balanced" wiring config for unbalanced (RCA) connection.

The bottom line, in case you don't want to read it all, is the STP cable despite being an excellent cable for balanced connections, fared worst of the tested lot for hum rejection when wired in the "quasi-balanced" way and used in unbalanced (RCA) connections.

 
loudnoises said:
Twisted pair is excellent for noisy environments like cars.
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If it's a true balanced/differential system, but what is the benefit of that with RCA connection where there is no separate +/- to allow true common mode rejection, as I understand to be the main point?
 
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