Balanced or Unbalanced?-Focusrite Twin Trak Platinum

[phillippowers]

Hey guys! I'm new to this forum, and new to the home studio thing. I've been recording drum tracks, guitars, bass, keyboards in studios for the past 10+ years (and vocals recently) and I decided to start experimenting w/ my own home studio setup. I recently purchased a Digi003 Rack and ProTools 8...I'm running it on my MacBook. I've had nothing but great results and I just have a quick question about hooking up an outboard pre.

I purchased a Focusrite Platinum TwinTrak Pro. Right now I hooked it into my Digi003 w/ balanced cables in channels 7 and 8 (1/4" jacks.) I also set it to -10dbv. Is this correct? My two main questions are the following:

1) Should I use balance or unbalanced cables?

2) Should I set it to -10dbv or +4db?

Any help would be much appreciated.

[jagcmos]

You should be using balanced cables whenever possible.
They have better noise rejection properties and allow for much greater cable lengths.

Use the +4db setting.
+4db is used to connect pro level gear like your using and -10db is used to connect consumer level gear such as cd players.

[brandondrury]

Right now I hooked it into my Digi003 w/ balanced cables in channels 7 and 8 (1/4" jacks.)

Does your Digi003 have TRS inputs? TRS is the only way to get balanced I/O with 1/4".

Brandon