The iPhone offers a myriad of fascinating apps that are extremely useful for musicians, from sound effects to multi-tracking, tuning, looping etc. In order to tap into this large vault of apps however, I needed to first figure out how I could connect my bass to the iPhone via a line-in cable somehow.
After almost of week of research and trial and error, I finally figured a way out and have decided to share my findings here. Hopefully this will help you avoid the frustration I went through.
COMPONENT PARTS TO GET
CABLES
Ready-Made Cable Kit
Here are 2 ready-made line in cables in the market for the iPhone
1. Guitarbud by PRS - http://www.prscables.com/guitarbud Approx USD 30
Designed for use with the PRS iPhone app Jam Amp, it however has received complaints about the cable’s low quality component parts with unshielded wiring that renders it noisy and unpredictable. Distortion and bad latency also occurs when the guitar exceeds a certain volume.
2. AmpliTube iRig – http://www.ikmultimedia.com/irig/features/ Approx USD 40
Designed for use with the IK Multimedia’s iPhone app AmpliTube. So far, i have not found any big complaints about this cable, and comments are it is noticeably cleaner and quieter than the Guitarbud.
DIY Cable Kit
Buying the iRig would have been a simple solution for me, but it was not available in Singapore at the time I was inquiring. Plus I needed the cable urgently for a Yamaha Bass Clinic I was conducting, and could not wait for it to be shipped in from US.
My next solution was to make my own kit, without having to actually solder anything. Here are 2 options.
1. Camcorder A/V Cable splitting 4-pole 3.5mm plug into 3 RCA plugs
Be aware that not all A/V cables are wired the same – the ground has to be on the second ring of the TRRS jack, not the sleeve.
NOTE: I tried with 2 camcorder A/V cables that supposedly matched the description above but the iPhone apps did not detect my bass with both cables.
2. A/V cable designed for an iPod video product eg. Belkin A/V cable for iPod 4G/5G
This cable worked immediately for me, plus the high quality cable minimised cross-talk (appears as feedback at high volumes).
ADAPTERS
Adapter For Headphones
I could not find a RCA Female to 3.5mm Female adapter (best option), so I bought an RCA Male to 3.5mm Female adapter (picture above), and attached RCA Female adapters (picture below) to the RCA Male jacks – as displayed below in ASSEMBLY at the bottom of this article.
2 x RCA Female Adapter to RCA Female Adapter
Adapter For Guitar
RCA socket to 1/4″ mono plug
ASSEMBLY
Attach the RCA Male to 3.5mm Female adapter to the 2 RCA Female to RCA Female adapters. You now have a RCA Female to 3.5mm Female adapter.
Now connect this to the Belkin A/V cable, matching up the red and white RCA connectors.
Attach the RCA socket to 1/4″ mono plug to the yellow RCA plug on the Belkin A/V cable. This plugs directly into the guitar.
DONE!
You now have a cable kit you can use to connect the bass or guitar to the iPhone. I hope you found this useful, if you have any questions drop me a line at wendy[at]wendyphua.com and I’d be happy to try and help.
Hi Wendy,
The iRig is available in Singapore for demo at Trolley. Check out http://www.trolley.com.sg for the address. Cheers.
Hi! this was a nice share youve made. I will make sure to forward this to my colleagues
Hi Wendy,
I read your article here & also saw your youtube with the bass..that’s really great!
My question is what else can I buy besides that berklin AV cable?
I looked into some store here in my place & they dont have this.
Thanks!
Hi Jom,
You should be able to find the Belkin at any store selling Apple products, hope this helps
cheers
Wendy
Hi Wendy
Thank you for sharing this DIY cable kit. I also have some questions..
Where do we need to get these components and what are the name or brand of the AV Cable. (don’t what to end up buying 2 or more AV cable like you before my Iphone detects my guitar lol!)
I saw some AV Cables last night at Vivo City at DIY Store donnu if that was the right cable also white in color.
Thank you looking forward for your reply.
Hi Archie,
As mentioned on my website, Belkin A/V cable for iPod 4G/5G works fine (yes it’s the white cable) but any camcorder A/V Cable splitting 4-pole 3.5mm plug into 3 RCA plugs should work too. You just need to make sure the ground has to be on the second ring of the TRRS jack, not the sleeve.
Not sure about the DIY store at Vivo, you can also try Sim Lim Square but note that I bought one cable from Sim Lim that was supposed to work, but it did not. From my experience, if you can spare the cash, just get the Belkin and you’re guaranteed to connect to the iphone correctly.
Good Luck!
cheers,
Wendy
Oppss! sorry about that my bad I read too past.. Yes I’m now looking for Belkin AV cable.. Because I got a cable from Sim Lim and I don’t know why it’s not working though the ground is also in the second ring of the TRRS.
Thank again Wendy!
Hi Wendy, The iRig is available in Singapore for demo at Trolley. Check out http://www.trolley.com.sg for the address. Cheers.
Very good site, thank you so much for your effort in writing the posts. Like!
Hi
Wendy~
this article very useful.~~ lovely
please i want to know detailed velkin cable spec and photo, selling website.
sorry.. 1 more question
[A/V Cable splitting 4-pole 3.5mm plug into 3 RCA plugs]
Q: 4 channel 3.5mm plug (iphone plug channel composition)
1)1-signal,2-signal,3-signal,4-ground
2)1-signal,2-signal,3-ground,4-signal
what do you use cable?
please choice (No.1 or No.2)
thank you so much
@leedaelo Actually I had set up this cable way back before companies started producing these or distributing them more widely. These days you have a variety of iPhone interfaces to choose from:
PRS GuitarBud
Griffin Guitar Connect
iRig
AmpKit LiNk
GuitarJack
They are alot easier to use as you do not really need to figure out parts to put together like I had to. Let me know which one you decided to get and if it works well!
Hi Wendy,
We met some time back at Bani’s experimental music project at Substation. I just wanted to let you know that i am now selling irig and iklip hardware stuff in Singapore. In case you or anyone else would like to purchase irig or iklip please refer to my website for all the necessary details.
http://www.wix.com/slike2/irigiklipsg
Rupak