Depends on the pedal I guess. If the mass and ring inside of your TRS get wired in the pedal somehow, it doesn’t make any difference. If not, might be a problem.
Best would be to use a TS → XLR cable I guess.
Beware, though, I don’t have a lot of qualification in such domain… Maybe @darenager can bring more knowledge on the table 
If I may chime in with my non-expert two cents, though I have done some reading about these kinds of scenarios recently.
If you’re going from a pedal and you want to convert to XLR to take advantage of the preamp on that channel, I think the best bet would be to run through a DI box, or some circuit to balance your signal. What is the source (i.e. what is going into the the pedal / pedal chain? I think a TS to XLR cable might work (if they even exist), but I’m not sure. I don’t know how XLR / balanced connections behave with nothing present on the cold side.
Balanced cable, and thus a DI box are useful only in noisy environment, or if you have long distance cable.
If not, a simple TS to XLR is sufficient in my understanding.
Thanks @darenager
There is no reason for me to make it balanced as I’m running it into a mixer, anyway.
Ok so now on this topic: why does my dynamic microphone use XLR output? The mic itself can’t possibly be balanced.
Microphones are usually balanced as they’re supposed to be plugged to a long cable, it’s standard use for them. So professional microphones are all balanced, to my knowledge.
Are they now? Huh. Love learning new things even after all this time.
Balancing signal isn’t rocket science. It’s basically sending twice the same signal in two neighbor cables, one inverted. And a third giving the mass.
Sure SM57 and SM58 have been made since the 60’s and have always been balanced.
In fact, microphone on long cables are most likely the reason why balanced signal happened: low voltage signals need amplification, so you don’t want to amplify the noise that was added while going through the cable.
I had always seen mics come with TR ends (when they weren’t xlr) so assumed they were unbalanced.
Now I’m confused why they would do that.
Oh?
I’ve always wondered why guitar microphones were so poorly conceived, but I don’t remember having hold a microphone that wasn’t either XLR or stereo jack.
Which mic are you referring to?
I’m pretty sure I saw gigs where they were using xlr to tr. Basement shows, mind you, but still…
Even here on Amazon
But it’s probably to save a penny.
Ah, yes, but the mic itself is still outputting balanced XLR.
You can choose not using the balanced feature, when you plug it to a guitar pedal for instance.
Great thread… I actually just bought a Digitakt and was wondering the same on the cables. I am working with a Critter and Guitari Organelle M and an Empress Zoia. I just bought a bunch of Balanced Hosa cables but now want to know if I can use a balance signal to my outputs of the DT and go unbalanced outs and In’s of the Organelle and Zoia. Would the sound make a difference or should I go all Balanced on all my devices?
In my experience, it’s a lot simpler to stick with unbalanced cables with synths. Unless you have cable rubs that are greater than 25, or even 50 feet, balanced cables arent necessary. I wish I had figured that out before laying out the cash for the handful of balanced cables I already bought.
What they said. ^
That’s good to know. I don’t want to reduce any power or signal loss in between my chain. I’m a big tone freak with my Guitar gear and I’m new to the synth world.
The biggest difference is that synth (line) level is much higher than guitars or mics; which makes them much less susceptible to EMI and other noise picked up along the cable run.
maybe off topic, I apologise
what about optical cables? do they follow the same logic as instrument cables?
recently sold my mixer so currently I got 4 optical cables connecting converters to audio interface, paid 20 for 4 cables, I can hear quite a lot of noise but maybe that’s just the new converters picking up more of everything?
the shop where I bought the converters sells optical cables for 20 each…would it help?
thanks
I think people tend to massively exaggerate the impact low quality/lots of cables have on sound quality. Especially when people nowadays want devices like the Analog Heat or ‘warming plugins’ later in the chain precisely TO degrade the audio quality when it all ends up sounding too pristine.
I once had a sound engineer try to tell me that chaining two XLRs to extend the reach would dramatically deteriorate the sound of a bass guitar.
Mind you, the same guy went on to turn the gain up to full on every channel of his mixing desk, then just used the faders for everything else. The only time I’ve ever heard feedback from a snare… 
