AES New York 2011
Product Design Session PD1

Thursday, October 20, 9:00 am — 11:00 am (Room: 1E08)

PD1 - The Quietest Link—Better Noise and CMRR at Low Cost in Balanced Connections

Presenter:
Douglas Self

Abstract:
A balanced connection is usually considered a high-class connection compared with its unbalanced equivalent because of its proven ability to reject noise on the connection ground and other forms of interference. It is therefore rather unfortunate that the average balanced connection is some 14 dB noisier in terms of its own electronic noise. That difference is both clearly audible and hard to explain away to potential customers.

Another limitation of a balanced link is its finite Common-Mode-Rejection-Ratio, the figure that measures how well ground noise is rejected. Achieving a good CMRR is simple if you can use precision resistors but these are uneconomic for most applications.

This session looks at ways to improve both the noise performance and the CMRR of a balanced link without spending a lot of money.

Information Last Updated: 20111005, mei


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