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Fender Rumble Club

A balanced signal requires a TRS connector:

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I didn't think stereo cables were balanced so there you go.

You are correct, stereo cables are unbalanced.

I was referring to line level cables used generally to link audio equipment together (mixing desk sends, processors, rack effects etc.) use balanced lines but a lot of the time the cable that is used would not be the best choice for a microphone. Also many of these connections may use phoenix connectors or similar.

I guess I was just getting a little deep in relation to the question asked, but I just wanted to mention that it is not a general rule, but it will be what you encounter 99% of the time in a band situation.

In short...

Microphones are always balanced.

Instrument Level is always unbalanced.

Line level can be balanced or unbalanced.

The term doesnt apply to speaker level but it uses a 2 cores and in the case of the Rumble (and many speaker cabs) it is a TS connection the same as unbalanced line.
 
Interestingly the Rumble 500's amplifier is running in bridged mode. The 125ASX2 is actually a stereo or dual channel amplifier with the two halves running in opposite phase so it's kind of balanced. It makes no difference in operation but it's not a good idea to ground either leg under any circumstances, even the one with the black wire.

You'll notice the speaker jack has an insulating washer for that very reason.
 
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I think you are getting confused with line outs and speaker outs.

Speaker outputs are amplified, in other words they have already been through an amplifier, so you should never plug this into anything other than a speaker (unless you know what you are doing and have special "converters" etc.). There is no such thing as balanced speaker level, speaker lines just have a positive and negative core inside the cable, and the cores are bigger than signal cable. Out of phase is when two speakers are working at opposite wavelengths to each other (not going to explain this now) and is fixed by inverting the positive and negative to one of the speakers.

Line outputs carry signal, they are meant to go to other equipment. These can be balanced or unbalanced, and yes, you need to convert to go from balanced to unbalanced (and vice versa) but some equipment accepts both balanced and unbalanced. If the line is balanced, the cable has three cores (TRS) and if it is unbalnced it has 2 (TS).
there are some obscure tube pa's with a balanced speaker output, so like James bond says never say never. The requirement is there is no feed back circuit from the speaker secondaries, maybe some Stromberg carlsons?
 
subliminal message ... 5 more days ... 5 more days ... 5 more days ... :nailbiting:
I was accidentally awakened from my medically induced coma (so I wouldn't notice the wait time) because some one in the room was eating Cheetos and I smelled them and was instantly brought out of the coma. Good night, see you in 5 days, please, no Cheetos, this is serious business. I took this as vacation time BTW. I found out it was a nurse who was lacking in Vitamin Cheeto.
 
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