Ableton Forum

I have this thing screwed into the bottom of my desk, its there to organize cables. It's so messed up after 6 years that I now cannot get cables off of it. I have adaptors for dead harddrives knotted in there...

It's probably a good idea to do a cleanup every now and then.

I work with a lot of installers for A/V equipment and the likes, electricians etc and one of the most common causes of electrical fires is dodgy power boards or loose power connections.

I go through all these connections every few weeks and reseat them because transformers can work loose just under their own weight.

Also, if you have rats nests of cables behind gear you could also have insects and shit in them which could start getting into other gear. A PC I serviced for a friend had a blown motherboard because of a large nest of spiders.

I do like reorganising cables and gear every now and then. Helps you re-understand your gear and how it's all connected.

Velcro-tape is also useful instead of zip ties. Reusable, doesn't bite into cables and can be undone and redone when redoing cable. Get 20m of the stuff to use and keep handy.

Is there some law that says hardware manufacturers can't stamp their damn logo on the wall wart power adaptor? Fuck.

pics!

Those velcro wire ties are a god send for keeping things neat but still giving you some flexibility for moving things if need be. Those little plastic tabs that keep bread bags closed are great for labelling your cables temporarily too. I use those when I don't want to have to retrace all my cable runs to remember what is plugged into what, or which plug is left versus right.

I use those velcro ties for gigs. Before gigs I lay everything out nice and neat, wind everything up proper, label some things, make sure I’ve got backup cables and adaptors, and make sure it’s all packed in an order that makes sense for easy unload and setup.

But when the gigs over it just all gets pulled out and poured into a bag with no organization, even if I have plenty of time at the venue to do it.

At my last gig I even wrapped some odd purple color electrical tape around every common type cable so nobody would take mine and I wouldn’t take theirs. I still got home about 3 power extension cables short.

There's something rewarding about dumping out that bag of cables at home and untangling everything. Maybe it’s a metaphor for life’s problems.

Definitely.

@beats me

I keep an old record deck flight case for cables,
Di boxes, adapters, and leads can easily grow legs at gigs

based silver sharpie. l and r on 1/4" jacks, in/out on midi, and one could even label transformers for which device they go to... i lurv silver sharpies :)

Don't be afraid of cables, cables are our friends..

I try to rewire my equipment about once a year. To clean and see if I can improve the layout of the wiring.

My main advice, label everything. PSU, cables and sockets as well if needed (manufacture take note, how hard is it to paint that raised plastic text, with some white, so we can read it on low light).

Also make plans of the wiring, before you start and after (to include any changes made to the original plan).

Also Velcro tie warps, just got a roll for Xmas, that you can cut to size. Very handy for redoing wiring, when you have to move stuff around or get new equipment that needs wiring in.

One thing I'm still searching for is a portable label printer with mains power. Great for clearly labelling leads etc. But the battery's run flat so fast. Any ideas?

beats me wrote:Is there some law that says hardware manufacturers can't stamp their damn logo on the wall wart power adaptor? Fuck.

beats i know what you mean here... but i can tell you this... the device that the wall wart plugs into will have Input and Output voltage and amps... so if you match the input/output text on the wart with the input/output text on the device that [you suspect] it goes to... you can't go wrong. even if you get the wrong wart with the wrong device it will not matter as long as those numbers match. in this case wrong simply means that they did not come together, but they will work together... perfectly and without any harm or warranty voiding electrical abuse.

But why do they have to hide those numbers or print them in a stupid tiny font size? And that's not counting the power-receiving device in the other end.