[kid vic]

I have a Cakewalk UA-1G and i want to put it inside an old external hard drive case, change the 3.5mm headphone out to TRS (balanced or unbalnced) outputs and turn the headphone scroll dial into a rotary pentometer. Essentially I want to turn this into a more solid desktop DAC. The reason i want the TRS outputs is so that i can run my Mackie monitors out of it and use the rotary pentometer to control volume; I'll be using the RCA outputs for a headphone amp.
 
My questions are as follows: How hard would it be to do the TRS mod? Could I change the scroll wheel to pento? Would I be able to extend some of the inputs by soldering wires into to make them longer?
 
 
 

 

[Armaegis]

Quote:

How hard would it be to do the TRS mod

 
You would only be able to do TS unbalanced since the headphone jack only has L/R/G, which you would split into: L/G and R/G
 
A fully balanced output would have: L+/L-/G and a R+/R-/G
 
 
Quote:

Could I change the scroll wheel to pento?

I'm assuming by pento you mean a typical axial potentiometer. Yes you could, but you'll have to remove the wheel and figure out which solder pads correspond to your L/R/G (there should be 5 or 6 in total). Alternatively, you could leave the wheel at max and run a pot after that.
 
Quote:

Would I be able to extend some of the inputs by soldering wires into to make them longer?

 
Technically yes.
 
 
If the whole point of this endeavour is mainly so you can run your Mackie monitors off the headphone out, why not just save all the hassle and just get a single cable that does everything? 1/8" Stereo to dual 1/4" Mono
 
Like this:
http://www.long-mcquade.com/products/1657/Pro_Audio_Recording/Cables/Apex_Electronics/A206MPY_-_Stereo_Mini_to_Dual_mono_1_4.htm

 

[kid vic]

Haha, I'm quite literally using that cable right now! The only reason I'm looking into doing this is because it seems simple and i want to get practice soldering and making DIY's.

 

[Armaegis]

Ah, well everything I said above still holds true. Easiest thing to do is just leave the UA1G alone and just build the box around it. Or crack it open and start experimenting...