moosers
Published on 09/29/11 at 12:36
The Little Labs STD Instrument Cable Extender is a simple and unique device that allows you to extend your instrument cable without losing any quality. If you didn't know, using really long instrument cables can actually cause you to lose some tone, so in the studio it's especially important to be aware of this. That's where the STD comes in handy. While it's not always necessary, in larger studios it's going to help you out. I recently used it in a studio where we wanted the guitarist and bass player to play in the control room and mic'd up the amp in an iso booth that was a decent distance away. Instead of connecting two instrument cables together or using a really long one (which we didn't have at the time anyway), we used the Little Labs STD, which saved time setting up and was helpful in the situation. In theory it isn't supposed to change your tone at all, but the house engineer at the studio who was helping us set up mentioned that it actually adds a bit of drive if anything, possibly overcompensated for losing signal. This can be a good thing, but if you're worried about any changes at all with your sound, definitely A/B with and without STD to make sure truly sure. At the price of a bit over $100, the Little Labs STD Instrument Cable Extender is a good thing to have around larger professional studios. It's not something that is necessary for live shows or home studios (unless you've got a huge one), but professional studio owners should check out STD to see if it's something that might be helpful to them in the longer run. Since I don't own a studio, I won't be looking at getting one of these any time soon, but do hope that the studios I work at have one when I need it.