Dana Simmons is a professional audio engineer and technology consultant and dabbles in instrument invention, synthesizer construction and other experimental music and technology related projects. Here he rambles about his recent projects and such.
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Memories of the summer
Friday, August 1, 2008
Headphone/Monitor Switch in a can
Frustrated with having my monitors and headphones amp on separate outputs. I cooked up this wacky and simple switcher to select where to send the main outputs from my desktop workstation P.C.
Basically it is just a DPDT switch wired up to a set up 1/4" TR inputs, fed from outputs 1 and 2 of my sound card. The switch can either trow the signal to the headphones amp or the monitors. I simply grabbed the closet empty semi rigid container I could find (I.E: empty soda can) to house the wiring and such. In the pictures below I've only completed 2/3 of the wiring as I still have to add a second set of outputs (I ran out of female 1/4" TR plugs). Thus, in it's current state it simply acts as a glorified on/off switch. Once I get some more TR plugs I'll put it all in a proper enclosure and it will find a happy home on my desk. Build pictures bellow.
I scavenged some 1/4" female plugs from an old mixer. Bellow are all the build materials (minus two female TR plugs of course)
Here is the can with the holes punched out, I just used a flat head screwdriver and a little ub3r skill to cut "X"s in the aluminum, then simply folded the corners in.
Soldering the TR plugs:
Inside the can after all the TR plugs are installed
After the switch gets installed
And finally 2/3 of the finished project