[wxcarne89]

Hey guys, I am new to the community.
 
I am honestly nearly certain I can do this. I don't really see what it could hurt. If I were to give it a shot, should I wire the tiny xlr's as I would an unbalanced rca to xlr interconnect? I just ordered 2 Viablue 3.5mm connectors, and 14 feet of Via Blue's "neon" braided cable sleeving. I have a pair of Audio Technica athm-50's and a pair of Grado sr80i's I am going to recable. I am not a big fan of soldering a jack onto either of these headphones, so I would like to just add a male/female jack inline to make a breakaway cable about 6"-1' from the cans.  
 
Any ideas on what cable to use. I am not really sure if either of these cans are nice enough to merit high end cable so I could just modify the stock cables, use something like canare mini-quad, or I could go all out and order some cable from Double Helix Cables, or even possibly ordering some teflon coated silver cable. Just looking for some advice, I wouldn't want to spend $80+ on 36 feet of cable and not here a difference. 
-Thanks!

 

[FraGGleR]

I think Doublehelixcables is running a DIY promo on his wires, so if you want to try high end DIY wire, it is a good time to do so.  
 
If you aren't comfortable with DIY cables yet, I would advise getting extra connectors and practicing on the stock cable.  I started out my journey usine mini starquad from Mogami and really liked it.  Don't expect to hear dramatic differences in the cables, regardless of what you use unless you screw up, then it will sound worse.  
 
Only by trying for yourself can you determine what any of this is really worth.
 
Also, make sure you plan out where the two mini xlr's will hit on your body while listening so you don't have them somewhere irritating.

 

[wxcarne89]

Hey thanks for the advice!
I hadn't really put a lot of thought into where the mini XLRs would fall quite yet. I do think I will order some canare mini quad and make the entire cable seperately from the headphones, then attach it. It actually looks really easy to re-cable these cans. From what I am reading the ath-m50 likely wouldn't benefit to much from high end cable.
 
I am going to make a twisted/ braided cable out of DHC, or similar, for my grado's though. My family owns a recording studio, and I am a computer technology major, so i've soldered quite a few 1/4 inch cables and such over the years, but before I start soldering on the expensive viablue connector I am going to make up some XLR cables from mogami mic cable for practice(It's been awhile.)
 
Is solder from rat shack for "PC and Electronic Components" appropriate for what I am doing on the AT's? I will defenitly use nicer solder when I re-cable the grados, but I have a lot of this solder around, and i'm not foing anything fanct on the AT's.

 

[FraGGleR]

Good idea to practice with cheaper materials before working on more expensive stuff.  As for solder, when I first started out, I bought just a few feet of Cardas Quad Eutectic solder based on recommendations from cable builders at the time.  I haven't used anything else since then when doing cables, but I doubt using electronics solder would significantly alter the sound.  As long as you make good joints, it should all work fine.
 
Have fun and post pictures!

 

[wxcarne89]

Will do. While I am at it I am going to use the excess cable(w/ the nice stock cable) and six feet of black techflex I have laying around to make a mini/1/4 to 1/4 inch adapter as a nice looking all purpose cable. I'll post some pics as I go! Thanks!