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[Jim Williams]

Since this subject was blocked I thought I'd re-open the subject since it needs further discussion. In a microphone body the ground is connected to the body as a screen. Every mic I've seen has an internal connection from pin 1 to the mic case. That in turn connects to the XLR connector shell via the locking tab on the cable. One can use a continuity meter to confirm this. There is no need to solder an extra wire from the ground tab to pin 1 inside the cable.

On the other end it's a bit more complicated. Mic preamp designs vary. In many cases there are two grounds at work, one is power ground, the return path for the audio electronics, the other is chassis ground, that which connects to the ground tab on the AC power connector = shield.

In many designs those are kept separate for good reason. In those cases pin 1 (power ground) is not directly connected to chassis ground. It's isolated via a cap, a resistor or a combination. 10 ohms isolation is common. The reason is ground loops. You do not want the pin 1 power ground connected directly to chassis ground as that creates a loop via the AC chassis ground flowing back through a rack case into the next piece of gear. The 10 ohm isolation resistor prevents that loop, the cap across it allows for 500 hz and up to be AC connected to ground to avoid buzzes. 120 and 60 hz won't pass through the small cap and won't loop.

Again, the XLR cable case does connect to chassis ground via the locking tab, that provides all the extra shielding you need, connect that to power ground (pin 1) and issues arise.

Bill Whitlock is the reference on this subject, he's an international expert on audio grounding, has written dozens of articles for the AES and the trades on the subject and was the President of Jensen Transformers. I'd love for him to weigh in here.

[RadarDoug2]

The point I was trying to make, well put. In a typical situation you can not allocate a particular XLR cable to just one mike, and cables move tasks freely in a studio or live rig. And in that situation, grounded shells cause problems.

[klaus]

In a typical situation you can not allocate a particular XLR cable to just one mike, and cables move tasks freely in a studio or live rig.

If you label mic cables (not just for one mic) as such, you avoid any misapplication of using mic cables in line-level connections between AC-powered units. Keep them separate, and you will not have issues with ground loops.

[RadarDoug2]

Well I guess audio professionals all over the world must be irresponsibly sloppy! But they do get the job done!
Klaus, most cables in the world will not have their shells connected to pin 1.

[klaus]

...and that is exactly one of two problems I encounter from "audio professionals all over the world".
The other: lack of shield termination on both connectors.

If there were a problem, I would be the first to hear about it from my clients. Not one in all these years has complained about added noise or hum, after following Neumann's recommendation, which I came to follow, from my own experience: eliminate RF/cable hash by terminating shield/ground in mic connectors on both ends.

[RuudNL]

In the past I had a different problem: increased mains hum when pin 1 of the XLR connector was connected to the shell of the connector going to the input of a mixer..
At the moment I disconnected the shell, the mains hum was gone!
It seemed there was a potential difference between the audio ground (pin 1) and the case (safety) ground of the mixer.
So you never know...
(This says probably a lot about the quality of the mixer too!)

[klaus]

Please confirm that the XLR cable in question was connecting to a microphone, not between two other components.
And, I repeat: an open shield on even one side can lead to hash/noise in the mic.

[RuudNL]

It was indeed a cable going to a microphone! (So: connected to nothing else.)
At the moment pin 1 of the XLR on the microphone input was connected to the shell of the connector (=mains ground), a clear mains hum was audible. (I suppose this was due to a design fault in the mixer. This happened on every channel.)

[Jim Williams]

Please confirm that the XLR cable in question was connecting to a microphone, not between two other components.
And, I repeat: an open shield on even one side can lead to hash/noise in the mic.

Again, the locking tab connects the shell to the ground connection, there is no need for an extra internal wire from the ground tab to pin 1. Use a continuity meter to confirm this.

[Kai]

It was indeed a cable going to a microphone! (So: connected to nothing else.)
At the moment pin 1 of the XLR on the microphone input was connected to the shell of the connector (=mains ground), a clear mains hum was audible. (I suppose this was due to a design fault in the mixer. This happened on every channel.)

The cable’s internal connection of Pin 1 to Shell bypassed and deactivated the mixer’s ground (lift) configuration, by interconnecting the formerly separated Audio Ground with Chassis Ground.

Specially bigger analog audio mixers have a hard time avoiding internal ground loops, usually there is one single central Audio Ground - Chassis link, or a really thick copper rail as ground reference.

[DarinK]

What's the best procedure for an XLR cable connecting a tube mic power supply to a mixer? The cable is not directly connecting to a microphone. Is it more akin to a cable between two powered units, even though it is not carrying line level?

[klaus]

My first job is to never see a mic again after I work on it, due to something I did or did not attend to while the mic was in my care.

I always terminate the internal wiring inside the power supply between multi-pin mic connector and audio XLR exactly the same way I described: Ground and shield and connector to ground, both sides of the cable (by the way, chassis ground connected to audio ground is the norm in most vintage supplies. (See as example the grounding scheme in the NG).

If there were ever a problem in all the years I used that scheme, I'd think at least ONE person would have notified me that there was something wrong where there was nothing wrong before. I am still waiting for that call.

I will address the critics of the Neumann termination in a few days, and show more examples of factory-terminated mic cables.

[David Satz]

(to DarinK's question) Yes, the latter. The microphone cable can be connected as Klaus suggests (and as Neumann does it) only because a microphone isn't normally connected to any other external "ground" reference. In nearly all other cases it's a better bet to let the connector shells and cable shields connect only to the equipment enclosures, and to connect the cable shield to the ground pin only on one side of the cable.

Unfortunately this wasn't well understood when the conventions for XLR cabling were established, and now there's a lot of resistance (no pun intended) to realizing that the best arrangement for microphone cables isn't also the best for making connections between other types of equipment. People understandably want XLR cables to just be XLR cables; they want to use them for all purposes interchangeably. But that isn't the best actual choice in most cases.

I'm hedging my statements, though, from hard experience. Sometimes there isn't time to investigate the causes of a particular problem, and you gotta do whatever works to get rid of hum or other noise from interference. I'm a strong supporter of standards such as AES48--but to my knowledge, no one approach can instantly and reliably fix all hum and RFI problems. I think that all advice on this subject has to be hedged with "of course if there's still a problem, try something else, even if it doesn't seem to make theoretical sense at the time."

Things that you wouldn't necessarily think of can cause problems--for example, Jim W. mentioned that shield and ground are generally connected within microphones. But sometimes that's by means of a screw that holds the housing onto the body of the mike, and that screw can become loose or dirty, or it might be painted or corroded so that it doesn't make good contact. (I've had that happen.) Or sometimes the connection is by way of a wire that isn't short enough to be fully effective at the higher and higher radio frequencies that are increasingly prevalent, or the wire can break or come loose, or ... or ...

Decades ago, microphones weren't designed to protect against problems that didn't exist yet. At best they were built to work in broadcasting studios where a conventional AM, FM or TV transmitter was in the same building or nearby. That's a challenging enough problem--but what we have today is categorically more severe sometimes, e.g. boom operators for film and video sound who connect their microphones directly to digital wireless transmitters. Microphone manufacturers are having to keep up with rapidly changing conditions.

[Kai]

... chassis ground connected to audio ground is the norm in most vintage supplies.

It’s a user selectable option on a lot of studio equipment... vintage or contemporary.