Mods for Soundcraft Ghost

Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2001 5:11 am

<blockquote>quote:<hr>Originally posted by Aaron Carey:
laugh all you want but this board has great mic pre's and super kickass EQ that I would gladly have a rack of.<hr></blockquote>Aaron, you need to get out more. Those mic pre's and eq's suck the big one my friend. You might as well drape a green plastic garbage bag over the tracks. Try a LANG PEQ-2 if your looking for a taste of what EQ can be or an API 560 Graphic or how about some Neve and API mic pre's. Hell, call up Fletcher and get him to send you a Great River NV two banger. Oh my fucking God, you don't know how much you're going to laugh at your statement in a few years once you've been exposed to the good stuff. Of course YMMV. <bg>

Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2001 5:12 am

<blockquote>quote:<hr>Originally posted by Aaron Carey:
That was the mod I heard about. Running the console from batteries. Way less ground noise supposedly, and no ripple. How would you set that up ? and would there really be less chance of grounding problems ?<hr></blockquote>What do you do when the batteries die in the middle of a session? <bg>

Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2001 9:24 am

<blockquote>quote:<hr>Originally posted by mp@soundtechrecording.com:
Oh my fucking God, you don't know how much you're going to laugh at your statement in a few years once you've been exposed to the good stuff. Of course YMMV. <bg><hr></blockquote>
Just so you know, I used to run Vintage Recorders, in phoenix. We had custom tridents, trident TSM, Neve Kelso, Neve 51 series, Neve 8108, SSL E, Studer A827's, Ampex master muncher, SONY Dash, and mitsu Pro-Digi, a matched quartet of M-49's, Telefunkens, C-12's the whole lot. My new place has focusrite mic pre's among others.I dont dispute that these ghost mic pre's are not the best but for distorted guitar especially, I will always find myself using them. The E-Q's on the other hand, I gotta take issue, they really are nice! no joke! I would in a heartbeat buy a set of rackmounted ones to carry around. Laugh all you want.After using the SSL, the noise of this ghost bugs me, but i mix mostly in software now, so its not really an issue, except when I have to use the summing busses, which i have given up on.

Posted: Fri Aug 17, 2001 4:15 pm

I take issue as well! The ghost is no way a Neve/SSL, but it don't SUCK. Cool

Posted: Tue Aug 21, 2001 12:10 pm

Fookin' fook fook.Well, U guyz are gonna love this. My Ghost is now on its belly here at the lab, and we have made some startling discoveries. Fellow Ghost owners, listen and ponder.Again: with the console powered up, all inputs disconnected, all channels muted, master fader up -- HUM CITY on the 2-bus.Well, we started taking this thing apart. We disconnected the headphone amp, and lo and behold the hum floor dropped noticeably.Then we disconnected the CPU assembly, and the hum floor dropped AGAIN.Then we started going over the caps in the master section, and a couple of 'em were clearly fried. (This is without even LOOKING at the rest of the console for now.)What gives, guys? This board ain't that old... 4-5 years or so, tops. I could not BELIEVE the improvement in the hum floor with the headphone amp and computer disconnected. Not to mention the bad caps we've already found. Aaargh!!! Is this normal?Frankly, I can live without the wimpy built-in headphone jack anyways, and I will probably never use the console computer for anything. MIDI mutes? Don't need it. And my DP rig has the SMPTE reader/generator thing covered. So the only thing I lose without the console CPU is the mute groups.But it is pretty disturbing that this board sounds sooo much better with all that stuff offline. The burning question is, does my unit just need a bit o' spit and polish to bring it back to factory spec? Or is this an actual design flaw? Ya gotta wonder what the guys at Soundcraft were thinking. The console CPU is encased in what looks like a lead "hum shield" coffin, and all the internal ribbon connectors elsewhere in the console are littered with shielding as well. Why would Soundcraft put such heroic hum shielding around the CPU, unless they KNEW it was a potentially lethal hazard to the noise floor? Yeah, yeah, what do I expect from a "price-point" console... but I swear, my trusty Mackie never had issues like THIS.If I'd known I was gonna be looking at these headaches, I woulda thought twice -- more than twice -- before "upgrading" from the old Mackie.Well, back to the belly of the beast I guess. Type atcha later.....-e

Posted: Tue Aug 21, 2001 12:39 pm

..............."I was using a ghost and the headphone jack nut was loose causing problems...then it fell through...because someone did not full tighten it and then it caused more problems..."...and should have elaborated about the headphone amp too...see?!!!!Glad it is back in ass kick mode again..Not a bad console at all for the price and much better than any mackie (analog) I have tried especially on the eq's.....

Posted: Tue Aug 21, 2001 1:45 pm

Have you checked to see if the 2-mix hum actually gets recorded on your mixes?Last week we were tracking on the Ghost at my friend Phil's "Stewdio," and there was quite a loud hum in the headphone jack under the console armrest.BUT...no noise in the regular headphone feed. (mix B)AND...no noise in the rough mixes at the end of the night. (Mixed down to a Masterlink.)SO...I think you're on to something when you disconnected the MIDI-mutes, etc. Keep us posted.hope this helps,SC

Posted: Thu Aug 23, 2001 8:18 am

<blockquote>quote:<hr>Have you checked to see if the 2-mix hum actually gets recorded on your mixes? <hr></blockquote>Yah, believe me, it's there. At first I thought it might just be a monitoring problem, but when I played back the mixes... AARGH.Ya know, this whole project is getting pretty depressing. It kinda bugs me that I should have to strip down this console's functionality (by ripping out the CPU and headphone amp) to get a decent noise spec out of it. Am I polishing a turd here?If I could fit a short-loaded SSL into this room, I would do it in a second. Is there an alternative I'm not thinking of? Some kinda 32-input mixer that'll fit into a Mackie- or Ghost-sized footprint, with an ultra-pure signal path. All I want is clean 'n' quiet. I don't need mic pre's, I don't really even need EQ's... I just need summing and level control. Maybe I should buy a couple of those Manley 16x2's, or that Millennia Media thingy.Well, back to the lab...-e

Posted: Thu Aug 23, 2001 8:36 am

No hum with 2-mix down?Do you hear hum on the output of the master inserts? Is there hum from channel direct out, insert out etc?Same for subgroups?

Posted: Thu Aug 23, 2001 8:46 am

<blockquote>quote:<hr>Originally posted by EJolson:
Yah, believe me, it's there. At first I thought it might just be a monitoring problem, but when I played back the mixes... AARGH.Ya know, this whole project is getting pretty -e<hr></blockquote>
I assume you listened to the mixes from a unit not connected to the console?

Posted: Thu Aug 23, 2001 10:05 am

<blockquote>quote:<hr>No hum with 2-mix down?<hr></blockquote>Just to clarify: everything is disconnected except for PSU and a pair of headphones. All inputs are muted and deselected from busses. The hum on the 2-mix can be controlled with the stereo master fader, i.e. with the fader down you get no hum. Fader up, with EVERYTHING muted, you get hum. <blockquote>quote:<hr>Do you hear hum on the output of the master inserts? <hr></blockquote>Yup. <blockquote>quote:<hr>Is there hum from channel direct out, insert out etc?<hr></blockquote>Nope. Well, according to the AP there *is* an infinitessimal bit of hum on a couple of channels, but certainly nothing to get excited about compared to that 2-mix buzz. <blockquote>quote:<hr>Same for subgroups?<hr></blockquote>Yep... curiously enough, this hum seems to be common to the entire bussing matrix, not just the 2-mix. <blockquote>quote:<hr> I assume you listened to the mixes from a unit not connected to the console? <hr></blockquote>Yeah, we played back both DAT's and CD-R's thru the respective headphone outs on those units. Don't worry, I haven't lost THAT many brain cells.... yet. <g>God, I am so depressed. I am this close to abandoning ship. Hey, has anyone checked out the D&R Vision? It looks interesting... a hi-quality piece that oughtta fit in a Mackie/Ghost-sized footprint. Anyone worked on one?

Posted: Thu Aug 23, 2001 12:18 pm

"Then we started going over the caps in the master section, and a couple of 'em were clearly fried." "Yep... curiously enough, this hum seems to be common to the entire bussing matrix, not just the 2-mix""Nope. Well, according to the AP there *is* an infinitessimal bit of hum on a couple of channels, but certainly nothing to get excited about compared to that 2-mix buzz."This doesn't sound like a problem with the PSU since you would likely have the same hum on the entire console, individual channels included.Burned up caps in the master section sounds like a very likely problem source since many caps are used to filter noise. This board may have had something plugged into it wrong or an interal short of some kind. I haven't heard many people complain about 2-buss noise in these boards except for problems with the headphone jack.YMMV
Good luck

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