Happy Holidays!! Great discovery: The USB Isolator 😎😉

Hi loopers!!

"Technical" Christmas gift for loopers!!!

I have to share with you this research that I have been doing for a long time. If you are the looper who uses a sound interface with digital effects to upload recordings to WL you should briefly read this post ;)

Although a technical explanation goes beyond the idea of this post, I have discovered how to largely eliminate the annoying parasitic noises that sneak into our recordings that have multiple origins: environmental electromagnetic contamination, cables, power supplies, shielding of cables and pickups in the guitars etc etc.

A solution that eliminates this contamination, although not 100% (let's say 95%) is to use a data and power source isolator from the USB socket of our computers. This simple and cheap technical solution is the USB Isolator.

ADUM3160 USB digital isolation USB isolator module (based on this chip)
https://www.amazon.com/GeeekPi-Isolator-ADUM3160-Isolation-Protection/dp/B07QKYYCD8

In short, if you use this USB as an intermediate power source for your sound card, you can greatly reduce parasitic noise due to interference by isolating the digital data on the 5v power circuit, which is a determining factor in the origin of this noise, among other causes.

The empirical demonstration of recorded audio with high signal compressor is this:
https://www.wikiloops.com/backingtrack-jam-285050.php


In the blue area I record with USB isolator and in the brown part without this device, under the same technical conditions, your ear must decide!!!! The interference is more evident in the brown zone when I separate my fingers from the contact of the guitar strings,I also spread my fingers in the blue area but you can barely hear it!! !!!
This recording was made with the power outlet connected to the laptop and a high compressor signal so you can see the big difference, I also have the tone pot open at 80-90%!! which, as you know, is where you hear these annoying high-frequency interferences the most.


There are several technical conditions that you must consider for yourself, but for the price it is worth experimenting in your recording setting. My recording environment is this where I have managed to reduce these magnetic contaminations to a minimum:
- use of good shielded connection cables
- isolate the guitar microphones with copper tape (there are tutorials on YT on how to do it)
- stay away from external power sources from the outlet, although with this USB isolator you can have the power of your PC or laptop connected, which is the great advantage. If you usually record with 100% battery on your laptop, much less interference is generated.
- ferrite cores in power and sound cables (see you photo)

You should not use this option if you want high data transfers, are limited to 12MB or need voltages higher than 5V for your recording equipment, but for most audio interfaces this is not a problem. I have read power problems with Focusrite brands, but I think it should work for most

If you record from external amplifiers, consider that the noises generated in the amplifier, microphone and cabinet will NOT BE eliminated with this system, which is only useful if you use sound cards and VST digital modeling (such as Guitar Rig, Zoom, etc....)

I hope this discovery is useful to you, it works very well for me.

Greetings to all

Happy Holidays 🥂🥂

PS You can get this same USB at the Chinese online sales giant, I don't get commissions from it or from Amazon :) 🙂 :)

My simple setting in this photo:
- the black plectrum points the USB isolator
- the brown plectrum indicates the ferrite core mentioned on the laptop power cable, which alone don´t eliminate this interferences :(

https://imgur.com/tXNiUw0

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GlezBass attached the following image:

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Edited by GlezBass on December 21, 2023 at 3:00 PM

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