Today's Lesson

A common misconception with balanced cables is that balanced is synonymous with stereo. A balanced cable carries two signals along with a ground wire, so one could possibly assume that the two signals are a left and a right. This is fundamentally incorrect. To recap Sound Advice | Balanced Cables, a balanced cable consists of a hot and cold signal plus a ground. The hot and cold are the same signal that are reversed in polarity from each other. When the signals meet at the end of the cable the negative is flipped and summed with the positive resulting in a mono signal. This is done because when the negative signal is flipped, it also cancels out any noise and interference that might have been picked up along the way, allowing for much longer and cleaner cable runs. 

That said, it is actually possible for a balanced cable to carry a stereo left and right signal. It is a bit rare, but there are two wires in the cable carrying signal, so it is possible. When this happens however, the signal is no longer balanced, so what you end up with is a stereo unbalanced cable. You do get a stereo left and right signal on one cable, however, it does become susceptible to noise and interference. 

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