Stupid Question - Stereo to Mono

Jeff Anderson

Jeff Anderson

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Ok stupid question (I think) but want to double check before I go and fry something.

Am wanting to monitor audio wirelessly from my HDP2's line out (stereo RCA's) using a set of G2's as a makeshift comtek. Is it as a simple as just going from stereo rca's to a 1/8 stereo connector through an stereo to mono adapter?

Have seen one reference on the internet to such an adapter ruining some guys headphone pre-amp supposedly but lots of people seem to be using with success.

Will use same adapter on the other end to get both sides of the headphones firing too, but I know that should work fine.

Just looking for some reassurance that this is the way it should work.

Thanks

Jeff
 
Any time you short an active device you are asking for trouble. It depends upon hou robust that device is as to whether or not you will exceed it's capacity. Make sure you are impediance matching too. Dont drive a hi Z input with a 8 ohm driver. There are active impediance matching devices that will take care of you.
 
That's what I'm a little worried about - can you point me to the best way to connect a stereo line out to something like a g2's line input? I'm a little foggy on impedance matching too. Time to go do some reading me thinks... Thanks Dadin - appreciate the help on this.
 
The G2 transmitter's input takes a stereo plug but it's not a stereo input. Mic levels signals should be wired with signal hot going to the TRS plug's tip while line level signals are wired with signal hot going to the TRS plug's ring. The most reliable way to do it is to make up your own Y cable and not use adapters at all. Wire the cable so both left and right RCA signal goes to TRS ring, left and right grounds go to TRS sleeve, and the TRS tip is grounded to the sleeve. The plug assignments are in the back of the G2 manual.
 
The cheapo adapters you get from radio shack and your preferred big-box electronics store are intended for splitting signals, such as taking a mono headphone out from some ancient device and letting you use your stereo headphones with it.

This note gives a decent explanation.
 
Sweet, didnt know that was in the manual. Sounds like an easy enough cable to make. Will shorting the right and left signals together or the grounds together create any sort of a problem?
 
Jeff, that would get the signal down to mono, I can't speak to weather or not you can pull this off with the G2s. I assume you'd need a headphone amp or something at the receiving end, but someone else will be able to answer that better than I.
 
Sennheiser makes a dedicated line input cable for the G2's, part number CL2 at $29 MSRP. Others have explained this better than I will, but basically the G2 transmitter is pushing a little voltage into the mic, and the line input cable is designed to block that. That has a female XLR; there's also a guitar input cable, the Ci1, that might work if you needed 1/4" (or you could probably just get an adapter).

On the receiver end, if you're using the portable receiver, you're coming out mic level (unless it has a menu option to switch to line, I haven't had the chance to play with ours much yet), so you'd probably need a way to boost that up to line level before even a headpohne amp would do much with it.
 
Just an update - fashioned a little stereo to mono summing cable with the schematics in the Rane link above - works great and does exactly what I need. Am able to get a very loud feed with the g2's into my headphones. Actually have to turn it down a bit on the receiver end. Thanks for everyone's help, much appreciated.
 
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