Technical question on interconnects and valve amps

[adamrobertshaw]

I have a couple of pairs of Van Den Hul interconnects that have earthed terminations at one end of the cable.

Whenever they're connected in a line (either before or after) with my Pathos Aurium (valve headphone amp) there is colossal distortion which makes earphone listening impossible..

It doesn't matter how I connect up the interconnects. It doesn;t matter where I use the earthed interconnects in the chain, or whether the earthed terminations are connected at input or output.

For example, at present I connect the Qute HD to the Aurium, then tape out from the Aurium interconnected to input of the pre-amp, and then interconnect up to the power amp. The earthed connectors are between the pre and power amps with the earthed terminations at the power amp.

Listening to the Aurium via headphones I get instant distortion. Pull out the interconnects from the Aurium's tape out and there's an instant cure.

If I play music through the loud speakers there's no distortion. All the distortion is experienced through the headphones. I've tried my Senny HD800 and Grado 325i. Both get the same distortion.

I'm baffled!!*help*

 

[davedotco]

Ok, here goes. Two possibilities.

Your VDH cabes are wired out of phase with each other, this causes signal cancelation and when using 'phones you are effectively listening to a 'difference' channel.

Or I think you have an issue with the earthed cables combining chassis and signal earth, when in this instance they need to be kept separate. Or possibly the other way round, difficult without actual hands on.

 

[adamrobertshaw]

My gut feeling says the second.

It's not a show stopper. Just odd and a tad inconvenient having to remember to unplug the tape outs from the Aurium when I do some headphone listening.

Thanks