[LAD] [semi-OT] midi snakes using CAT5?

Gene Heskett gene.heskett at verizon.net
Sun Nov 1 23:56:15 UTC 2009


On Sunday 01 November 2009, Arnold Krille wrote:
>Hi,
>
>On Sunday 01 November 2009 16:47:44 Jörn Nettingsmeier wrote:
>> i'm playing with my shiny new BCF2K, and i'm going to use it some
>> distance from my machine, so i'm going to try a midi link instead of USB.
>> what is the maximum length of midi chain that you have used without
>> problems? i read somewhere that no more than 15 meters are recommended,
>> which strikes me as pretty short even if it's unbalanced.
>> my idea is to abuse a cat5 cable as a triple midi loom - do you think
>> that could work? pinout would be as follows:
>> 1	midi 1 signal
>> 2	midi 1 ground
>> 3	midi 2 signal
>> 4	midi 2 ground
>> 5	midi 3 signal
>> 6	midi 6 ground
>> 7	common +5V
>> 8	common +5V
>
>If you want to make use of the drilling of the pins in cat5, it should be
>
>1+2 Midi 1
>3+6 Midi 2
>4+5 Midi 3
>7+8 Midi 4
>
>Why do you want to carry 5V? According to my docs, Midi is just Signal+ and
>Signal- and shield. Which, when carried over Cat5, should be all on the
>shield.

Except that I have yet to see a piece of cat5 with shielding.

>I made myself some adaptors Midi->XLR->Midi a year ago but never actually
> used them to date.
>
>Have fun,
>
>Arnold
>


-- 
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