mic cable thin tails and shock mounts

[JEGG]

Neumann USA (and their office mates from Sennheiser) are (or were) absolutely insistent on pin 1 to shell connections-and especially at the microphone end. One writer above said, essentially, that with a device the shell would be connected by friction, and therefore there was no functional shield loss at the device.

This is not the same at all as connecting pin 1 to shell. Why? Because, according to Neumann/Senn USA, these sorts of friction connections work very differently at DC and audio frequencies, as compared to RF where the connections can behave quite differently.

To put the issue into larger context, though, this message was most iterated shortly after the 180 series was introduced, and users were experiencing cell phone problems at a rate which started to make the mic's unusable for many owners.

Before Neumann made a few mods in their 180 design, many users who followed this advice did indeed get rid of their cell phone problems.

I was always left wondering, though, why no other manufacturer's products-at any price point- were garnering legions of cell phone disaster stories.

This has gone a little OT from the Sennheiser extension cables and the original topic, but as far as the generalities of pin 1 to shell connections, that was the official word at that time.

[LX3]

I'm also vaguely re-thinking my original stance on not connecting pin 1 to the shell. Because I recently discovered that pin 1 on SSL gear (eg Duality) is connected to the chassis, which of course is connected to mains earth.

I always followed the rule of never mixing audio ground and mains earth.

At which point I had that sudden mental clarification that pin 1 is NOT really audio ground.... which of course is the whole point of balanced.

Still, I will have to re-examine why I was always taught never to connect pin 1 to the shell. There must have been a reason?...