Nobsound 3-IN-1-OUT XLR Audio Switch Review

[Trdat]

I would love for this to have an XLR for the centre speaker to hook up the a third connection from a home theatre receiver.

That way we can switch between the home theatre pre amp and a stereo pre amp.

 

[Sg86]

Does anyone know somewhere that has stock of this? I can only find the 1 in 3 out version on Amazon (UK)

Thanks

 

[phoenixsong]

I was wondering... Will the channel bleed reduce the SNR of say a 120dB SINAD and 110dB SINAD DAC by an equal amount?

 

[gasolin75]

Something with 4 rca in and with xlr out for my Saba A20 a ?

 

[rvsixer]

Something with 4 rca in and with xlr out for my Saba A20 a ?

Getting off topic, but you could use one of their 4-1 RCA switchers and an XLR conversion on the output.

 

[gasolin75]

xlr conversion just sounds like a rca to xlr cable, shure i can try a rca to male xlr cable vut that not what im looking for

 

[rvsixer]

You should start a new topic (or better yet research the many many other threads/articles/blogs that already cover balanced<->unbalanced conversions).

 

[Yasser 06]

As far as i know XLR carry two copies of the signal, among whom one is negated, at the they copies are subtracted again leading to 2S the noise variance is them like sqrt(2) the initial one and so the ratio is sort of divided by sqrt(2).

For XLR-> RCA you can simply pick one signal, but when they do RCA-> XLR i don t think they introduce -S in the minus branch.
So we get half XLR signal, intead of getting S- (-s) =2S one get S so the volate at the end of the circuit will be only half of what is expected.

I hope that for XLR->XLR they truly maintain both the "positive" signal and the "negated" one.

I shall need a XLR passive pre-amp (volume control, attenuator) and that one could do the job, the switch function will probably be handy to.

But 85 euros is quite a lot.

 

[Gradius]

They released this one too (by the end of 2017), is 100% "solid state", no wires at all, just a single PCB, with the components soldered directly to it.

So must be easily beyond -120dB.

Can works either way, 1 input to 3 outputs or 3 inputs to 1 output.

 

[rvsixer]

Both wires and PCB's are solid state yes?

 

[Gradius]

Both wires and PCB's are solid state yes?

Actually NO.

Wires can act just like an antenna, so they pick up a lot EMI specially if not balanced correctly.

Even if balanced, they can still get noise from space, just like what an antenna does.

 

[rvsixer]

So to the original point - both operate as solids, yes?

Interesting though that copper wires connected point to point, operate/behave differently than copper traces wired point to point (Poynting). I know of PCB's laid out as antennas. Will research as this is new to me.

 

[Gradius]

So to the original point - copper wires connected point to point, operate/behave differently than copper traces wired point to point. Will research as this is new to me.

If you don't believe me, just do it, is very simple.

Put your cell phone close to the wires, and make a call to it.

 

[rvsixer]

If you don't believe me, just do it, is very simple.

Put your cell phone close to the wires, and make a call to it.

With no defined setup, I chose worst case I could think of (audio signal running through unshielded speaker wire, wrapped around cell phone one turn). Worked fine making or receiving calls.

 

[phoenixsong]

With no defined setup, I chose worst case I could think of (audio signal running through unshielded speaker wire, wrapped around cell phone one turn). Worked fine making or receiving calls.

Is that post amplification or pre?

 

[Blew]

I just ordered the 4(1)-IN-1(4)-OUT RCA version with volume attenuation (Little Bear MC6). The high quality components caught my eyes: ALPS 27 pot and CMC rca sockets. I needed volume control between my tube phono preamp and my hypex ncore amp. So now my Topping E30 DAC and the phono preamp will go through this switch. Looks to be promising but it won't be here for a couple of weeks. Hoping this is as "clean" as the other passives in their lineup.

How was it? I need a simple 2 in 1 out RCA switch that's as clean as possible.

 

[Hemi]

I have a question about the MC103-Pro and input/output switchers in general. I own two MC103-Pro: 1-in-3-out and 3-in-1-out, but I don't use them anymore since I've noticed crosstalk issues with both units.

I had 3 headphone amps connected to the 1-in-3-out unit and could hear music playing through inactive outputs. I tested the 3-in-1-out unit with XLR gender reversers, and it had the same sound leakage on all the outputs.

After that, I decided to try a more expensive switcher and purchased the VS-4X by Kramer which cost $200+. It's a 4-in-1-out selector. Unfortunately, it had the same crosstalk issues. The sound leakage could be noticed between all the channels even if none of them was selected. I sent the unit back to Kramer and described the issue. They could not confirm the problem, but sent me a new unit as a replacement ...and it had the same crosstalk issues too.

I went even further and decided to try a professional recording studio switcher. I purchased the Coleman Audio MS6R hoping that such a unit should be well-engineered and built, and fortunately, it turned out to be so. I currently use it in my chain because it's dead silent between all the outputs even if I crank up the volume to the max.

So here's my question –
Why such an issue with such a simple device can easily be detected by ears but not by audio analyzing equipment?

 

[ra990]

So here's my question –
Why such an issue with such a simple device can easily be detected by ears but not by audio analyzing equipment?

I don't think that's the problem. It can easily be detected by any audio analyzing equipment, it's just that you almost never have a second input sending signal while you're testing something. It's a specific test to check for interference between inputs. One can assume you would only need one input active at a time and so you'd be able to mute the others at their source. I realize that's not always an option, but, like you discovered - you have to pay for perfection.

 

[Hemi]

I don't think that's the problem. It can easily be detected by any audio analyzing equipment, it's just that you almost never have a second input sending signal while you're testing something. It's a specific test to check for interference between inputs. One can assume you would only need one input active at a time and so you'd be able to mute the others at their source. I realize that's not always an option, but, like you discovered - you have to pay for perfection.

I think the people who design and build such switchers should conduct more thorough testing. If it's designed to be a hub for multiple input/output devices, why do they only test one input/output at a time?

I hope @amirm can retest this unit and revise his conclusion. I personally would not recommend the MC103-Pro to anybody.

 

[daftcombo]

This seems a good option then:

Coleman Audio LS3 Line Level Selector | Reverb

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