Balanced to RCA Adapters

The two options available to you are buying the adaptors, as you suggest, or buying new cable. If you have very good quality cable, and the $150.00 price of the adaptors is proportional to the price of the cable (not too much), then go for it. Remember though there are good quality cables for about what these adaptors cost, including the excellent Elementa series from Purist Audio, where you are already looking.

You can make adaptors rather inexpensively and easily from quality parts from Michael Percy Audio. He has a web site. If you are unsure of how to do it, he can help you.

I'm using adapters right now on my Balanced audio technologies vk-200 amp. I have a passive preamp that doesn't have balanced ins or outs and I will never give up my passive for a powered preamp. DON'T BY CHEAP ADAPTERS. I have cheap ones and it sounded good but when I took them apart they had super cheap very small guage stranded wire in them so I put some solid core wire in there instead. It's still not thick enough but the sound difference is phenominal. Way more bass, waaaay deeper soundstage and way better imaging. huge difference. I WAS JUST ASKING SOMEONE WHERE TO GET HIGH QUALITY ADAPTERS but they had no idea. THANKS SENICKOLS. Anyways if you do want cheap ones you can get them from the company that makes my amp B.A.T. I have a very purist and revealing system so you may not even notice a difference if you use the cheap ones depending on your gear (or upgrade them like I did. It's a pain in the but though). Anyways if you pay $150 for the ones you want then it will definitly sound good and should in no way degrade the sound. Hey it might even sound better.

I'd go with the Michael Percy advice, as I've dealt with him and been pleased with his service and expertise. But Kacz, let me relate my experience with wires, in a passive preamp (which I too prefer over ANY active one--I'm selling a CAT SL-1 III). I used Kimber AGSS at first, multistranded 19 gauge silver, in a passive with Shallco switches and Holco resistors. When I changed to 36 gauge wire, supplied by the maker of Stealth cables, the improvement was huge! Read the Malcolm Omar Hawksford article, "The Essex Echo", reprinted in Stereophile a couple of years ago, and see if you still believe wire for line level signals should be thick. I can't follow the math and physics, but my ears tell me, NO!

Hi Tom_nice. I looked for the article but could not find it in the archives. I'm glad that smaller wire worked better for you. But did you go from a bigger stranded to a smaller solid core? I do not use stranded at all. It's all solid core. I got rid of $5000 of MIT cable and interconnects for $150 of home made stuff. 10 gauge power cord, 14 gauge speaker wire and 4 strands of solid core 18 gauge per interconnect. This stuff smashed the MIT. It's not even a question of preference it's just way better. Yes infinite amounts of conducting material does not mean the sound will be infinitly improved. Actually to much wire could be bad since wire does store and release energy and the more wire the more it will do that. I've found that to small of wire will dull the sound not letting the details through. So someone may prefer that if they had a harsh or bright system . Basicly I feel that my system is not forgiving at all. If I have a weak link anywhere my wire will let me know where it is. Anyways It takes experimenting and all I can say is the stuff I have is doing an incredible job and I've gotten huge improvements from upping the gauge in my interconnects the other day from 2 18 gauge strands to 4 18 gauge strands. Also Allot of systems may not have the clarity to notice a difference. (by the way I'm not refering to your system in anyway because I have never heard it. I'm sure it sounds great). System:Thiel speakers, B.A.T vk-200 amp, and reference line preeminence one series 2 preamp. NO LINE CONDITIONING no need for it. I just use my home made cords for that too!

Cardas makes a set of high-quality adaptors for $50.

Does anyone have the web addresses for any of the above mentioned sights? I am looking for female rca - female xlr adaptors for one of my new DAT decks. For the analog it only has balanced inputs and outputs. I need adaptors so I can use it with my normal cables. I figures they would be as easy to find as hitting the local Radio Shack but I was wrong.

Well after wasting countless hours looking for these damn adaptors, I found them at Sweetwater, musician store.You can go online at Sweetwater.com. Click on accessories ont he left side of the page, then click "cables and adaptors", then adaptors. The 14th item down the list is Hosa RCA(f)- XLRF adaptor, price $8.97 each.