Overbridge & USB cables & ferrite beads

The Lounge General Discussion
#1

So, with Elektron coming out with Overbridge soon, the ability to transfer a lot of data through a usb cable seems fantastic. My question is that a lot of my USB cables have ferrite beads on them to tame High Frequency Interference. Some forums say they’re great for stopping GPS and other radio waves from adding noise to the signal path, where as other show how much the signal is changed by having one of them (smoothing of square waves, etc, etc).

I’m just curious to know what others here think of this, and maybe if someone from Elektron could say thumbs up or thumbs down on the matter and if it affects it or not. I’m guessing thumbs down since their nice red cables don’t have a ferrite bead or maybe it’s a cost factor?

cheers,
Patrick

#2

Sometimes a red USB cable is just a red USB cable…lipstick on a pig, if you will. It’s ALL just marketing hype, that’s all.

I am more interested in how Elektron will prevent massive midi loop problems with OB.

#3

are you speaking in terms of ground looping?
I’d be interested to know as well.

#4

Red cables aside, ferrite beads are a proven type of Low Pass Filtering of EMF. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrite_bead about half my cables that come with products have them.

So, I’ll state the question in a simpler way:
Will a ferrite beaded usb affect overbridge/syncing/data adversely?

1 Like
#5

no - but only if you dance naked in a circle, under a full moon, in the 4th month of the year of the monkey - otherwise, the emf spirits will become angry, and give you bad audio

Digitakt freezes when saving project
#6

LOL!

#7

with an usb cable you transmit only digital data. dont worry about the ferrite

#8

Ferrite beads should have no effect on the signal quality of Overbridge.

However, some USB cables with ferrite beads are proprietary and made exclusively for a certain device (often digital cameras, scanners) and they might handle the data in their USB protocol adjusted to the ferrite bead on their cable. It is quite unlikely that this would have any effects on other devices and USB protocols though.

In the end of the day it’s digital data, if it is a bit smoothed out or not, it’s still a high value and a low value and will be converted correctly. :+1: