It did say "noise microphone cable" on it so it performed as expected ;)

Clearly that cable is well-past its sel-by date!

Pretty crap soldering job. I made audio cables through my highschool years for a reputable local company. Those pins got nowhere near hot enough. The cable fits down in those holes, and should be seated as far down as you can manage. Then the shield should be shorter than the inner core to provide strain relief, then there ends up being no tension on the cores so they don't break like they have here

looks like a cold solderjoint. didn't even properly attach to the metal on the plug

I bought a load of unbranded stereo audio cables from eBay to allow me to connect anything to anything (RCA, 2.5mm, male, female, etc), thinking they’d be useful to have around. The left and right channels were reversed on 50% of them.

About the same quality soldering you would see in any main brand XLR cables. They're all basically the same mass produced half-ass solder job. In my experience the shielding on the cables doesn't matter as long as the signal remains balanced all the way from source to destination, but once you lose one of the signal wires, inverted or non-inverted, you lose 6dB of signal and gain 6dB or more of noise and the handling noise starts in whenever you touch it. And with a properly balanced signal you technically don't even need the ground or the shield wires. ;)

I order the parts and solder my own XLRs and cables... don't trust pre-made audio cables very much.

The outer braid isn't a shield, it's a ground. The nature of balanced audio signals largely negates the need for shielding.

Back before you were born I worked at a TV station that was adding a new studio, which involved something like a Bazillion XLRs to be attached to cable runs. For some reason the boss really liked my soldering and OCDness, and I got to solder most of 'em. It really is NOT that difficult to do it right.

That's a new one to me "Dry as a dead dingo's donger"...😂😂😂😂

The shielding is adequate for a differential signal

The Yongsheng connector is a off brand from Neutrik

When I get new audio cables, I usually tend to open connectors if they are not molded and check soldering and cable so that I know if I can trust them. And for some applications I just buy cables and connectors separate so I can make my own custom cables for specifications I want, and it is usually cheaper that way too than buying whole cable locally.

The lack of shielding should not be a problem, what with it being symmetrical and twisted. All in all it doesn't look that bad, even has a cord for force transfer. Shame about the soldering.

The worse part is taking hours thinking it’s the mic, or something else. Then just discover changing the cable takes away the hum or pop. And some cable companies cut back on the shielding for more flexibility to call them stage cables, thus can cause unwanted signals interference. A good stage flexible cable would use more shielding wire at smaller wire gauges winded together. I guess you do get what you pay for. Even a good expensive cable can go bad, took me a few weeks to discover an intermittent hiss sounds was caused by one cable. The behind the screen of being a KZfaq creator. Your the director, audio technician, video technician, lighting tech and what ever you do on your channel also.

I'm surprised you don't make your own cables Dave. IMO ready-made cables are expensive and the soldering/construction leaves much to be desired. I prefer making them myself.

Such cringe worthy soldering! Can't stand seeing bad cables like that as a sound engineer with OCD. Makes me want to take a plane flight over to Australia just to check your other cables and resolder Neutriks onto everything!

This is why i make all my XLR cables myself with Neutrik plugs and Belden cable

Not enough heat + time during soldering. The cable has been put together too quickly. Don't scrap it, rework it (both ends) and put it to less critical duties. Everyone with a box of cables should also a own cable tester. I like Behringer's, it's good at detecting intermittent opens.

At least the cable has some shielding. I have bought one RCA cable with 3 tiny wires of "shielding" so i don't be surprised by this kind of quality.

A lot of pro audio guys are 'Neutrik or nothing". Almost all pro audio gear uses them because A: they are really that good, and B: a lot of people won't buy gear that uses other brands. FWIW, I suggest ordering the parts and making your own cables.

Why didn't you repair the cable? Seems a waste ripping it apart.

Yongsheng is Neutrik's Chinese manufacturer. I'm about to replace a female Yongsheng XLR on a cable integrated into a K&M boom arm. The contacts are unreliable now. I suspect the spring tension that grips the mating pin in the male is not quite good enough for a solid connection anymore. Thats' not a reflection on Neutrik branded connectors - they are far better than Yongsheng. All connectors have an expected number of reliable "insertions" that vary according to both the design and the manufacturer. I have yet to have a Neutrik XLR fail as a connector even with repeated frequent insertions. I've had plenty of others fail. A suggestion for Neutrik XLR connectors -- get silver contacts in preference to gold and gold in preference to nickel. Avoid nickel if at all possible. Silver is the most conductive metal and has almost zero resistance. Silver oxide (the black tarnish) is almost as conductive as silver. Silver plated contacts where both surfaces are silver plated will not wear through -- the silver will transfer between sliding mating surfaces even if it becomes exceedingly thin. Gold won't tarnish but copper in gold alloys can tarnish into green gold oxide. Like most metals except steel/iron, nickel will acquire a thin surface corrosion over time that doesn't progress further than an exposed surface. Nickel corrosion is horribly non-conductive. The only reason 1/4" nickel connectors work is that the infinitesimal point contact inherent to its design tends to push away the surface corrosion in repeated insertions but not completely reliably. Unlike most other audio connectors, 1/4" connectors have an infinitesimal mating contact area. The flat folded contact spring in the typical female is a fold contact edge that touches the male cylindrical shape at right angles which is, mathematically, an infinitely small point. They work OK in well designed female designs that use better internal contacts that get a higher contact area.You'll see them in balanced line applications for line level (-10dBV and +4dBu levels) audio. Using them in high current applications such as connecting power amplifiers to passive speakers is very undesirable. Use SpeakOn connectors instead.

This is why I always build my own mic cables. I buy bulk Canare star quad and neutrik xlr connectors and make them as I need them.

On the female side on some of these cables the contact get expanded out and no longer work, anyone got any idea to fix that? I have become the student sound tech this last year for my high school jazz choir and I fixed a big box of these clables with bad solder jobs, they break fast because they get abused by the students from unplugging and plugging into the performance mics daily.

Sagan can probably solder better than that! I'd repair it properly and keep it as a spare (get out of jail card). That shielding will be fine for such a very short length. The purists will disagree and I respect them for that. Only to be used in an emergency until a proper one from Neutrik comes.

Shielding on an XLR cable is not as big of an issue since it's a balanced signal. Pins 2 and 3 are carrying the signal and a phase-inverted version of the signal, so all you need is a preamp/input buffer with good CMRR, and any interference that might have affected the cable is effectively canceled out. Shielding matters far more with unbalanced 1/4" TS cables.

Years ago, my band and I cheaped-out and bought a 10 pack of 6m/20ft mic cables to find similar cheese-grade soldering and almost no shield/screen coverage. Almost all were dead after 3 gigs. The following Sunday afternoon we ordered Neutrik connectors and Canare L-2T2S and went to town.

Since it is a differential cable, does it need shielding at all? I mean Gigabit Cat6 cables are UTP, if they have a + shaped separation lug. So whats the deal with 100% shielding or shielding at all...

I've always played safe with either Van Damme or Klotz cable, usually with Neutrik connectors. That said, I think that one would have worked fine, but for the poor soldering. The poor shield coverage probably doesn't matter too much on a balanced connection.

I would probably check it and resolder it before buying a new one :) edit: I wouldn't blame the retailer for the cable, just the company producing it.

Some of the noises can be attributed to an effect called "microphony", well known among musicians. Part of it has to do with small changes of the capacitance and therefore the impedance of the cable when being squeezed, stepped upon or torn.

I think SWAMP manufactures their own? I use a lot of their stuff and they sell both built cables as well as rolls of the cable plus the connectors individually - Neutrik, Yongsheng (which is actually pretty good quality). Either way the first cable you had looks like rubbish. If it has a spiral shield and it's thin, it screams cheap quality. I use Canare cable and Neutrik or Yongsheng connectors to build my own now.

Their iron probably wasn't able to sink enough heat into the solid pins. The sheet metal in the other connector has less mass and was likely easier to solder to

Our ears perceive louder as better. :)

The Neutrik Yongsheng connectors are clearly not the same quality as their German made *XX series, but they weren't really the issue here. What gave out was the bad build quality of the CABLE as a whole. You ALWAYS fill the solder cups completely and you make sure that the wire is stripped far enough that it goes all the way to the end of the cup. You want proper fillet on the end and it'll never come off... Then you make sure that there's just a few mm of extra wire inside the connector such that if the strain relief slips for what ever reason, the stress isn't immediately transferred to the solder joints. It had basically zero extra on the wires... so obviously it failed... Yeah, you pay for a quality.

A common construction problem with ready made cables is the conductive plastic sheathing under the screen. All too often not trimmed back providing a resistive short. I use lot's of cabling so I buy cable by the drum and bags of Neutriks to make my own. Here's a question: When using mic cable i.e. screened twin core, as a guitar lead (Jacks instead of XLRs) which gives the least core to screen capacitance, using both cores together as the Hot or taking one of the cores together with the screen? OR I guess leaving one of the two inners not connected?

in aussieland you need to hold the connector up-side-down while soldering.

What no resolder to get it working again and testing the improvement?

Shield coverage shouldnt be too important on a symmetrical connection.

Buy some Amphenol plugs and Van-damme cable from Farnell next time. Pre-made budget cables are always cost cut and rushed.

I guess for such a short balanced connection the shielding is sufficient.. But, the xlr cable I've bought (by the meter, cheap enough too) had a solid foil surrounded by a nice full braid, so i'd say this is sub-standard cable.

That's a really terrible cable. Even the cheap-ish XLR cables have a braided shielding. Also, when you want to dismantle the female XLR, you have to push on the latch while pulling the connector insides out.

I'm still pretty old school. Belden 8412 and Switchcraft connectors.

I stick with Neutrik or Switchcraft connectors and Canare star-quad cable and make my own. The ones I use in my office were made around 1990 or so, and I've never had a problem with them.

Actually the plugs themselfs are crap also. I had many connectors where I was not able to solder cables to the pins as their finish and plating prevents solder to stick onto. Very sad that this company used so bad components...

yet another thing I did not know; area of shielding can change according to required profit margin. Where will it end?

With good flux, you should get a solid fill in those solder cup contacts. Those who are looking to do perfect soldering, look up "J-STD-001 soldering". If physically possible, I make my cables/harnesses strong enough to hold the devices by. I make no assumptions as to how my devices are handled by people. If you want to put together perfect harnesses and cables, start with military-level techniques and work your way down towards what's practical for your application. You do need to be a little obsessive to make perfect cables. ;)

Yongsheng is actually a brand owned by the Chinese subsidiary of Neutrik. So that part is alright ;)

XLR cables use balanced audio signal, so shielding isn't as important.

Holy crap that cable's just awful. I'd expect a conductive polymer or metal foil shielding in addition to the braided shield. Shielding and noise with single-ended vs balanced transmission lines -- now that's a good reason to bring Doug in for a new video series!

I wonder how much gold plating would effect xlr connections.

I make my own using quad-core cable bought in bulk and neutrik connectors. The quad core (twisted pairs) really helps prevent the cables from picking up unwanted RF noise. Cheap cables are inferior and good cables are overpriced for someone with basic soldering skills.

That's definitely not typical. Any, at least ok quality, cable will have a braided sleeve all the way around the inner wires.

I've had really good experience with Swamp Industries cables. Had a project studio all wired using their cables, never let us down. Good quality at a good price.

For the things it needs to protect you from, the shielding is probably on par

As a person who has soldered MANY XLR connectors... Yes, the soldering is absolutely awful.

Ah, Swamp industries. I have some midi patch cables on my desk from them... They work alright, though their branding efforts look a bit cheap. (stickers on the plugs that come off rather easily.) Still, if it works, it works. Now if only I could say the same for the USB midi adapter... Midi is pretty poorly supported on modern versions of windows anyway, but I couldn't even get this adapter working on a windows XP system, and XP still had solid midi features... Such a pain.

Looks like factory moral is at an all time low. More whippings!

1) Solder never took to the pin (cold) 2) REALLY bad workmanship. 3) Pin #1 should not be bridged to the case connection, otherwise "ground lift" options will not work on devices so equipped. 4) Regarding shield coverage, looks to be 30 to 40%. Will work ok on a short balanced line, but inductive of real cheap cable. 5) Often knock-off XLR connectors do not have good mechanical tolerances. (A big red flag on those connectors.)

I wonder if Selby will ship you another cable to show some customer service.

Balanced cable; of that length; the ground coverage makes 0 difference.

7 minutes of a tear-down of a cable? I'm in.

also! never connect the shield (pin 1) to the chassis pin on BOTH sides of the cable! pick one side only!

No, not typical shield coverage. That's spiral wrap, maybe 60% if you're lucky. A good braid is 95% or better. Foil is 100%, but comes with its own problems.

😀😀😀 I used to work for Swamp industry as repair technician . I have soldered all the cables.Wow that's my job Very interesting 😃😄"Based in Canberra Fyshwick!!"

Looks like they forgot to heat the heatshrink at 6:50.

XLR cables guaranteed to break at some point. They will break just sitting in a box unused somehow.

Well, it would only need a quick resolder to make it good. Sure, that is poor, but that was an OK cable and should have been decent for a low cost item - which you said it was. Sometimes you can get a 'Friday afternoon' item from anyone, even Rolls Royce - I think Qantas had an issue recently, a loud mouthed self promoting twat of a pilot wouldn't shut up about it.... I would always give people a second chance as these things can slip through. This is not necessarily a bad outfit and I know I would feel terrible if I was judged on one dodgy item. Edit: Especially a cheap shitty lead...

"Drier than a dead dingo's donger" ROFLMAO

Try to only use Neutrik XLRs because they just fit like it should. I have seen cheap connectors that get stuck which could ruine your day and even your device ;) I also make all cables myself. Never had a bad cable unless it was heavily abused like jamming it in or under a door.

They may have tried threading the wires through the pin cylinder holes at the end before soldering.

Well, you got what you paid for. If you want a good cable, doing it yourself is the only way. Even brand name cables show poor craftsmanship.

working as a sound technician in tunisia I can say that this is not too badly soldered. I've seen some cables where the copper was just wrapped around the pins with some solder thrown at them.

One simple solution - do cables yourself. 5-10 minuts and it's done. Quality connectors and and cable don't cost that much

I enjoy a lot of your videos David, and I can understand your annoyance about a defective product, but I can not agree with you in claiming that a product or brand is bad only by analyzing a damn one single sample. I think that is not fair enough for a guy as smart and capable as you. Cheers mate.

Dave, at 1:17 the "Vincent" logo made me very nervous...even it's font...know where I'm going with this? lol

It is not the cable, it is who put the connectors.

Fleetwood Mac electrons in that cable... they “go their own way”

The good end didn't look too bad soldering wise... The bad end though.... The last time I soldered that bad, I was 10.

I use either Amphenol or Neutrik connectors with Canare cable.

Oh come on Dave. You bought a "Noise microphone cable" and expected to not get the "Noise" part ? It works just as advertised.

On the Selby site, Dave says "Looks legit". They sell HDMI cables for $5, so I'm sure they are. :)

Why do you just make them yourself? Buy the XLR’s (pref nautrik) and some decent cable and make them yourself. I know it’s cheaper buying one but getting the bits you can make whatever you want

Interesting teardown ;-)

Experience has taught me not to trust any cable manufacturer. I make my own cables including RG-58 BNC with full shield cable and banana plug test leads made with silicone rubber.

looking at the junk cable it looks like they used a section of electrical cord and re printed it for microphone cable. a really good cable should be shielded and use ofc oxygen free copper and metal tips instead of plastic and should maybe even have a screw to hold it together instead of looking like diy

I will "tell you what I think" I think if you wash white underwear with red socks, you will have pink underwear ... thanks for the Video i enjoyed it :-)

not enough heat in the joint, more than likely if you do heat the pin it will melt the plastic

This is typical these days. Reputable companies actually having their manufacturing done in , dare I say it, “China” and this is the quality of the product they thrust upon us for exorbitant prices. I worked at Philips as an engineer many years ago and they sent manufacturing off to China for their low to mid range AV products and discovered very quickly how little notice the Chinese manufacturers of quality control or quality assurance.

Never support cheap crap. For 99% of the consumers, the cheap crap just ends up in the landfill.

ewh..... if they want to save up on soldering time, why aren't they using crimped connections instead of.... that?

Focus hunting is killing me.

Never understood why anyone with a soldering iron would buy a pre-made XLR cable.

In addition to the crap soldering job, it's also not wired correctly. Pin 1 should NOT be connected to the shell. This is an infuriatingly common assembly mistake.

I'd make them myself (with Neutrik XX Series), or buy from Cordial or sommercable.

Making it bigger so it can fit inside the clamp thing is the story of my life.

What the hell is going on with this video? It suddenly popped up - saying it was released yesterday. So why didn't this show up in my subscription list - even I watched every EEVBlog2-video before...

that is one worst XLR solder jobs ive ever seen. i make 4pin and 3pin connections all the time at my job. so i know a bit about it. they are using 1 hung Lo brand of connector. you should use Nutrik. secondly they barley put the wire into the pin. those pins are hollowed out and go deep for a reason. you can get the wire at least 5mm in there before soldering.Look at time into video 3:51, cold solder joint.

Manufactured by the Sum Ting Wong company.