10 metres audio cable going into PC = too long?

I am in the UK.
I would like to take a stereo signal from the line-out of my stereo (or TV) to the line-in of my PC.
The equipment is in different rooms and the audio cable would be 10 metres. It will be this type: http://www.maplin.co.uk/images/full/130i0.jpg
I don't understand the technical side but is 10 metres so long that it might cause audio problems with things like frequency response or voltage/current levels and so on?
Will I need to get some higher specification audio cable to cover that distance? I want to keep cost down.

Andy wrote:
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I have used similar cable for a similar purpose over longer distances with no problems, for general purpose "listening" quality. Buying a higher spec cable is only going to give a very marginal improvement - if you really are interested in quality, you would link digital ports using an optical cable and not use analogue, anyway.

us:
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Excellent response!
The optical also reduces the number of elements in the run to one (TOS), or two in the case of speaker feeds.
Heck, there are even speakers that have their amps integrated into them that take optical feeds. In fact, that is the best manner to reproduce sound is an amp right next to the acoustical transducer. One doesn't need crossover networks in one's speaker if each driver has its own amplifier. Just massage the corners a bit.

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You might get unacceptable noise pickup, you might not. Try. You might also get hum. Sometimes it responds to simply lifting the screen connection at one end, sometimes you need an isolating transformer. Or rather a pair of them.
What's the link for?

"Andy" wrote ...
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The cable is most likely just fine. However beware of ground loops and other hazards of running audio over long distances. These have little to do with the cable.

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Expanding on that a little:
My "trans-workshop cable" is about 8 metres long and works perfectly. It's cheap audio cable (shielded of course).
The equipment on both ends is powered from the same electrical circuit and I don't have ground loop problems. You would have ground loop problems if the equipment were powered from different circuits. I gather that you are in the UK (hence "ring" wiring structure, which I like, instead of the American daisychain) and that everything is in the same room. It should work fine.

mc spake thus:
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So how does house wiring work in the UK? Is there more than one grounding ("earthing") point? And how is this better?
(Here, the Merkin practice is to ground the "service panel"--the box where the big wires come into the house--to a single ground rod, with everything running downstream from that.)
By the way, this brings up a strange experience I had recently doing some wiring. I was working for a guy who owns two houses right next to each other, and he wanted to run a cable TV connection from one house to the other. I was about to connect the cable in the attic of the house that was the source of the signal when I got a little tingle. After grabbing a VOM, it turned out that there was about a 20 volt difference between the two cable grounds.
Was this due to power line potential differences, or to cable signal potential differences, or something else? The cable guys do their own grounding outside, and I don't think they put in any bonds to the electric service ground. In any case, the whole project was abandoned then and there as a bad idea. (It occurred to me that a cable transformer could have solved the problem, but then so could doing the thing the right way: just getting both houses wired for cable.)

David Nebenzahl wrote:
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Mc doesn't understand ground loops. You can get them between two boxes plugged into the same double socket.
Your tingle was because your equipment is not grounded, and is perfectly normal.

Eiron spake thus:
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No, my tingle was because I was holding two cables strung between two different houses, each grounded at its end. Doesn't seem normal at all to me.

On Tue, 18 Apr 2006 23:32:56 -0700, David Nebenzahl
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Most likely the two houses weren't on the same phase of the three phase supply to the street. Their two grounds could have been doing very different things voltage-wise. You should always have an isolation transformer in a connection like this.
d

Don Pearce spake thus:
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I seriously doubt that, because then the potential would have been more like 120 volts, right? I think that's grasping at straws: so far as I know, PG&E (local electricity dealer) doesn't even supply 3-phase to residential customers. In fact, not even in come commercial districts. I owned a small business in Berkeley (print shop) until last year, and I remember the previous owner telling me about all the headaches he had in having PG&E put in a 3-phase converter (in an underground vault below the sidewalk outside). So I know that utility lines don't usually carry 3-phase power, except to large industrial customers.

On Tue, 18 Apr 2006 23:49:28 -0700, David Nebenzahl
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Why would it be 120V? The voltage would depend on how stiff the ground is round your way. As for three phase supply, no, individual domestic properties generally don't get that, but streets certainly do - that is the efficient way to deliver power.
Could be different where you are,of course.
d

On Tue, 18 Apr 2006 23:49:28 -0700, David Nebenzahl
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There'll probably be 3 phases in the street. houses, or groups of houses will be allocated a single phase.

"Laurence Payne" wrote...
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Not in the parts of the USA where I have lived (up and down the west coast). They break up the 3 phases back at the main road and supply only one of the phases to each street (or 2-3 streets depending on the load) It is not economical to run all 3 phases along residential (or even small business) areas.

On Wed, 19 Apr 2006 07:26:25 -0700, "Richard Crowley"
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So what do they do when somebody asks for three phase supply? Even a reasonably small business here in the UK might well do that if their power needs are significant. The power companies here actually prefer to supply businesses that way, particularly if they are also careful about their power factor correction.
Or are zoning laws in the States such that it is not possible to set up a business in an otherwise residential area?
d

snipped-for-privacy@pearce.uk.com (Don Pearce) wrote:
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The above does describe typical residential power distributionn. However, anywhere that industrial power (i.e., 3 phase) is available, there will in fact be all three phases available...
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Same in the US.
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That might be, might not be... it would depend on local laws.

Don Pearce spake thus:
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Reread my earlier post above. In it I described the situation where a business I once owned needed to have a power converter installed for 3-phase. This was in Berkeley, in a commercial district, not a residential one, and I think it's pretty typical of the Bay Area in general, probably the urban U.S for that matter. The power companies don't supply 3-phase power even to commercial areas; if someone needs it, they put in a converter. (We had a printing press that required it.) Most commercial businesses don't need 3-phase power. Large industrial customers do.
I think the converters can be shared, so if a couple or a few neighboring businesses need 3-phase power, they can all use the one converter.

On Wed, 19 Apr 2006 11:34:12 -0700, David Nebenzahl
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I'm surprised. Just down the road from me there is a small engineering company - they have a couple of mills, a few lathes and assorted other machine tools. The power company didn't even ask - they just got three phase, straight from the street outside.
d

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What is a "converter"? I've never heard of anything described that way.
Virtually all power is generated as 3-phase...
What you actually get merely depends on what the transformer arrangement is. Single phase residential power is nothing other than one phase from a 3 phase distribution system. All that is required to have 3 phase power is *more wires*!

Floyd L. Davidson spake thus:
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It's a device--a big, honking piece of electromagnetic equipment--that generates 3-phase power from 2-phase power. In this case, it sits in an underground vault beneath the sidewalk, covered by one of them metal plates.
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Nope.
Apparently not. If you don't believe me, ask PG&E (Pacific Greed and Extortion, as they're known around here). They don't run all 3 wires as part of their normal power distribution.
I know this thing exists, because I saw the crews working on the damn thing in front of my shop when it malfunctioned and the press stopped working.