Do mono splitters degrade sound at all?

[Auditor]

So right now I have my Sub37 going mono into a Flashback delay > stereo into Hall of Fame reverb > stereo into a SP-404sx. I think it would be better to have the pedals last in the chain. First question is, do you think I am correct in this thinking (that delay and reverb would be better after the 404sx)? 

 

Second question: If I send the Sub37 to the 404 first, I will need a mono splitter cable. Will this degrade the sound of the Sub37 at all? 

 

Thanks in advance!

[Guest Chesney]

Nah but what do you want to end up in? What's the 404 for, effects or is that where it will end up being sampled to?

Think about the effect chain, delay will delay the reverb tails so will be mushier than reverbing the delayed notes.

[Silent Member]

I'm guessing the sp404(if it's the OG version?) is the weakest link in that chain, wherever you choose to place it. The mono splitter shouldn't​ matter much unless it's broken.

[TubularCorporation]

Reverb first in the chain can be great for sound design purposes, though, but yeah, not ideal for conventional reverb.

 

 

It's possible that you could have issues with ground loops or impedance mismatches if you use a simple splitter cable, but it's not likely with newer gear, especially not at line level.  I agree that the SP404 converters are the weakest link (although not necessarily in a bad way, if it's anything like the 303 it degrades the sound in a way that I like a lot, personally) and should probably go as far upstream as possible so the downstream effects mask that instead of running through it.

 

If you don't mind spending the cost of a few pizzas and having a rack unit, the Rane SM-26 series is a really useful thing to have around for splitting and merging stuff.  The new prices are pretty high but they don't hold any resale value, just make sure you get one with the power supply because they're proprietary. I got two of them (26b version, probably late 90s) for $70 shipped total on eBay a couple years ago and split it with a friend (but one of them needed a new master volume so that was a little low, still you should be able to get a single one in good condition for that price easily if you keep an eye out on eBay, and probably less if you are near a city and watch Craigslist or whatever).

 

Really solid and reliable and useful, and doesn't degrade the sound.   Depending on how you set them up you can get anything from a 6 channel line mixer to a 2-in-6-out splitter.  The most interesting is probably to use it as three parallel effect loops.

 

Overkill for your current situation but I like to plug them because they're really useful utility items that are pretty much under the radar outside of the live sound world. 

[Auditor]

Thanks for the replies! I usually do put delay before reverb, conventional but safe. Right now it's going delay > reverb > 404sx. The 404 is for fx too, so the outs are going directly into my audio interface. I haven't actually noticed a degradation of sound when the Sub37 runs through the SP. I kept switching my headphones back and forth from the interface to the Moog and it sounded the same to my ears.

 

The reason I want the SP first in the chain is because I generally use it's effects (namely bit crusher and vinyl sim) heavily, and I figure the delay+reverb going in first might not turn in good results. Although, as RSP says, verb going in first can definitely be interesting. I'll fidget with it and see what sounds good.

 

So, the general consensus is that mono splitters don't fuck with the sound. That is good to know! 

 

Edit* So after reading this and second guessing myself, I did another A/B with the moog itself and through the SP. This time I noticed a subtle lack of low-end with the latter. Shit. I really like the SP's fx. 

 

So another question. I have zero familiarity with hardware send effects, but was thinking that I could use the SP as one. I am using a crappy behringer UMC404hd audio interface with 4ins and it also has 4 spots for effect inserts. Would anyone have the time to enlighten me on how I would set this up with the SP and Ableton? 

 

This is actually what I tried when I first set up my gear, but for some reason when the SP was plugged into the inserts on the behringer I got no sound from the line ins???

[Auditor]

You know what, I can probably answer my question with some simple googling. I'll do that when I get back from work. 

[QQQ]

SP can be used for send fx, i do it sometimes. i have a dedicated send/return on my mixer so use that. i've never used single channel inserts on it'd work the same.

 

i tend to put stuff directly through it and don't notice any real issue with audio quality, though like most things it has a little noise.

[Bubba69]

EDIT: I was going to suggest an analog mixer but I read your post about send fx. Yes, sends are cool. In a DAW you would have to worry about latency a little bit more but it's doable. I have no idea how to do it in ableton but I've done it in reaper and renoise quite easily. The beauty of this is you can record the effect to it's own track, use it for something else later, etc.

[TubularCorporation]

If you're using external send effects with a DAW one thing to remember is that your interface (even a good one) probably doesn't report latency very accurately and you're probably better of manually setting it.  Bit of a pain but you should only have to do it once unless you change the sample rate you use for your sessions.  The specifics of how you do that will be different for every DAW and I don't use Ableton but the basic idea is to patch an output of your interface directly to an input (with a cable), turn off automatic latency compensation in your DAW (for the interface, not plugin latency compensation, that's different).  Then send a short signal with a sharp attack, record that to a new track, and then measure the delay between the original track and the return that you recorded.  A sine or triangle wave is good for this because it's easy to see the peaks even after the inevitable distortion you'll get with even the cleanest interface, so you can be accurate to within a few samples without much work.  Basically you set your DAW to show the length of a selected range in samples and then select from a point in the waveform on the send track to the exact same point on the return track (usually the first peak in the waveform on each track is easy to spot).  The length of your selection is the total latency for your interface at that sampling rate, so the input latency and output latency should each be half that total.  Somewhere in your DAW options you should be able to enter those numbers manually, probably on the same page as where you disabled interface latency compensation.

 

 

I finally did it about a year ago and it was definitely a noticable improvement over the automatic compensation, at least on paper.  As far as how big a difference that makes in practice that depends on the kind of sounds you work with and the kind of outboard effects you're using.  It won't really be a big deal with delays or reverbs but if you're doing something like sending a drum loop out through a distortion pedal it will definitely keep the return track more tightly synced to the send track and save you having to manually line it up on the timeline every time.  Either way, it only takes a few minutes to do it, once for each sample rate you use, so it's worth doing. I spent 20 minutes or so to do it for every sampling rate my interface has and then saved the different numbers in a text file so if I have to work at a different sampling rate than usual I can just copy the appropriate numbers in to my options for that session and then change them back.

 

 

These instructions are written for Reaper but most of it applies to any DAW, and the screenshots should make it a lot clearer than my description.  Don't worry about the stuff in it about compensating for the latency between your monitors and your ears, that isn't relevant to using aux sends at all. 

[Silent Member]

Nice!

[Auditor]

God...so after like 3 hours of trying to get this to work, I just can't figure it out. I have output 3/4 of my audio interface going into the 404, and the outs on the 404 going into line in 3/4 on my interface. I tried every which way of routing audio in ableton, including using the external effect rack as and insert and then as a send. Nothing doing. Either I get part dry/part wet, no sound, or a brain ripping blast of feedback. 

 

Also, it seems that there is no way to turn on/off the effect inserts on my audio interface, so it's essentially the same as having my sub37 go through the 404 all the time. 

 

Fuck it, unless anyone knows how to make this work off the top of their head, I'll just redo the plugging whenever I feel like using the 404's fx. 

[TubularCorporation]

It won't help with the trouble you're having using send effects in Ableton, but you could patch the headphone out of the Sub37 into the effects, patch your effects chain to a pair of inputs and send the dry signal from the Sub37 to its own input, that way you wouldn't have to send the dry through the SP404 if you don't like the coloration (I'd take A/B testing of any kind with a huge grain of salt though, but then I also don't really care about sound quality being degraded/colored a bit most of the time).  If you try it I'd say keep your effects set the same as you would normally, except the last one in the chain before the interface - set that full wet.

[Auditor]

Yeah, the coloration is very minimal. I think I'm just gonna do the original plan and split the mono from the sub37 to the 404, and throw the delay and verb pedals at end of the chain and call it a day. The main reason I wanted to make the 404 a send was to be able to add my er-1 into the mix and let it be affected as well. But I can;t be bothered right now. Was hoping to make some music today and ended up drowning in wires for 3 hours. 

 

Anyways, thanks a ton for all the help!

[QQQ]

if you've got it working but part wet/part dry it sounds like it's set up correctly, just make sure the effect is 100% wet otherwise you'll get the unaffected audio coming through again as well.

[TubularCorporation]

if you've got it working but part wet/part dry it sounds like it's set up correctly, just make sure the effect is 100% wet otherwise you'll get the unaffected audio coming through again as well.

 

 

Oh wow, I completely misinterpreted the post and thought it meant "one channel full wet and one full dry" and since I don't use Ableton I wasn't going to even consider trying to give signal routing advice for it.

 

 

But yeah, I bet you just need to make sure the last effect in your chain is set to 100% wet.  Most pedals aimed at guitar don't actually have a wet-only setting although it's a lot more common on new pedals than old ones and I'm pretty sure the Hall of Fame will do it, but there might be a setting you have to change beyond just turning the FX Level knob all the way up.  I've never used it though.  Check the manual and make sure it's possible to set it for wet only.

[Auditor]

Thanks all.

 

I got it set up with the 404 first in the chain, and I'm just gonna keep it that way for now. Screwing around with routing and external fx in Ableton gives me a serious headache. 

[TubularCorporation]

Here it is, page 19 in the manual:

 

 

Kill-dry on/off
When  you  activate  Kill-dry,  the  direct  signal  is
removed from the pedal’s output. Use this mode
when you place your TC Electronic effect pedal
in a parallel effects loop.
To set Kill-dry mode, proceed as follows:
 
►
Disconnect the pedal and turn it on its back.
 
►
Unscrew the back plate of the pedal and look
for  the  two  small  dip-switches  in  the  upper
left corner.
 
►
The  lower  DIP  switch  (the  one  further  away
from the power in jack), switches between Kill-
dry on and Kill-dry off mode.
You can only remove the dry signal from the sig-
nal  path  if  you  have  selected  Buffered  Bypass
mode using the upper DIP switch – see “Switch-
ing the pedal from true bypass to buffered by-
pass mode”. Kill-dry is not available in True By-
pass mode.

 

 

If you're using it on an aux send you'll need to do that.  If you're just using the SP404 it could be the same situation.

 

As far as the effects that are upstream from it in your aux chain, you probably only want to have the last one in the chain set for wet signal only since you've already been getting your sounds with a blend of dry/wet passing from one effect to the next, but it's worth experimenting and seeing what sounds best. As long as the last one in the chain is wet only, you won't get any dry signal on the aux return, and anything upstream is just going to change how the effects interact.