Professional video connectors are crimped. But there’s one professional connector that is still soldered, the venerable XLR. It has become the universal standard for audio wiring. It is made by many manufacturers including Neutrik, Switchcraft, Amphenol and many others. You can even find some made by ITT Canon, who invented the connector in the early 1950s. And now Belden is working on a video to show you how to solder a mic cable (or a line-level cable) into this connector and will post it as soon as it’s available.

However, I wanted to add some comments which are not addressed in the video. Foremost is the tendency of some plastics to melt when heat is applied. And the problem is, the higher the performance of the cable, the more likely that plastic is to melt. The converse is equally true. The lower the quality (not the price, mind you, but the performance of the cable), the less likely it is to melt. If you have rubber insulated singles, such as Belden 8412 or our new super-strong 1776, you could hold a soldering iron on these wires for a long time. You might eventually burn through them, but it would take a while. Rubber, after all, is not a thermoplastic, it is a “thermoset” material.  Read more »