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anonymous 10 April 2005

I want to thank all the RO guys who have helped me understand the importance of quality mic preamps. I've spent many years using Mackie and PreSonus pres with nothing but mediocre results. Now that I have The Brick I'm making recordings that actually sound warm. I've been dreaming of this since the day I got my first DAW. I realize that a lot of you are poor like me and spending $360.00 on a mic preamp is not an option right now. My suggestion SAVE, SAVE, SAVE, The Brick is only $200 more than most single channel budget pres. You will never look back, I guarantee it.

I'd like to give a special thanks to Kurt Foster for helping me understand why Budget pres are close but no cigar. I know a lot of you like to blast Kurt for pushing expensive gear on the budget forum but you have to understand that he's just trying to save you money and heartache. there really are no excuses to buy budget pres when you can get The Brick for $360.00

Comments

anonymous Sun, 04/17/2005 - 01:46

Hi Kurt.

I have a question that is in line with the thread.: If you were recording a band: vox, guitar- acoutic and electric, drums & bass had eight presonus pre's, and ONE pre like the brick or similar/better... what would you use the good pre on?

How about two good pres? & three? Basically, you can see where I'm heading. What're the most important areas to prioritise ytour good pre's to?

Also, you mention the Kel HM1 can sound really nice with cheaper pres? I'm interested in this...and have been in liase with 'Mr Kel' re: getting some shipping over to test. 'How much' / 'to what extent' do you think mics like these can help with cheaper pre's?

BTW:this is a good thread that deservedly pays homage to a very helpful and sometimes under-appreciated man!

KurtFoster Fri, 04/22/2005 - 12:30

The answer is, what ever you think is the most important elements in the mix.

Remember that good pres can help the signal preserve its dimension as well as s/n and tonal quality.

I personally go for the kick and snare first then overheads. Toms usually are drawn out or gated between hits so they are not so important although what a nic mic and pre can do for a tom is a "be-uatiful ting".

Guitars and vocals as well benefit from good pres but you can do those as an overdub.

anonymous Mon, 04/25/2005 - 01:00

cheers... makes sense.

In light of this...I would say Vox for the live recordings when only one pre is available, as it's inevitably the stand out element...guitar if theres no vox. I kindoff guessed vox as no. one :)

I'm looking to go for the Sebatron 4000e when I've saved up. It's cheaper for me in OZ, and as it works out per channel, it's actually an exceptional deal. Around $650 AUD per channel.

Kurt, You've heard both the Brick & the Sebatron...how would you compare them (just looking at one chann of each...price aside),..just briefly if you have time. I'm Asking as the Brick is about the only other nice pre in that price range per channel

KurtFoster Fri, 04/29/2005 - 07:16

The Brick has a "chunky" midrange with a little grit ... while the Sebatron is very smooth and clear sounding at (low gain) until you drive it hard.

With the Sebatron you have a lot of different tones you can pull out of it, depending on how the pad and eq switches are engaged and how hard you drive the tube. With the Brick you only have the gain adjustment, so it pretty much sounds like it sounds on eveythoing you run through it.

These are both however quality mic pres and you will not regret purchasing either or both.

anonymous Sat, 05/14/2005 - 05:22

testing the waters... Brick SM57

maintiger wrote: offer the guy $360 and please report back to us

$362.5 for two.

coming from a unexperienced newbie using cheap and outdated
hardware...
in testing them they are warmer sounding than my much
cheaper ART TPSII 2-ch tube preamp, and ive only got two
pairs (4 total) of mics Oktava MK-319 (bought two for 1 at gtr center way back) and SM57s... Midiman FlyingCow D/A-A/D 24bit feeding
into Digi AMIII spdifs, PTLE 6.2.3
I tested them having the L channel be Brick and the R channel be
the TPSII. (panned hard L andd R) Much warmer sounds on both mics
with the Brick...

HOWEVER

1) with SM57s i have to crank the gain all the way
on the Brick to get any decent level out of them and the level is
midrange, id like to get at least -3db to -5db on the master fader
peaks... Ive cranked the gain on the A/D box and ive cranked the gain
on the AMIII input gain (although i think it only affects analog in,
not digital in) Im at a bit of a loss what to do to increase levels
for this particular mic.
caveat: i was trying to record acoustic guitar... maybe better results
with a louder source (i.e. electric guitar)
Id hate to have to feed Brick levels into the analog ins just because
they are only 18-bit and was planning to keep any 18-bit stuff to
secondary mics and (pre-planned) lower level tracks

2) Oktavas dont need the gain cranked, but still cranked up pretty
high (3/4) same source ac.gtr, required phantom pwr

3) need to test direct in still this weekend...

ANY TIPS OR SUGGESTIONS WOULD BE GREAT AND APPRECIATED!!
yours truly,
Edgar

anonymous Sun, 06/12/2005 - 08:01

I've seen the light too...

and it sais "you get what you pay for". Cheap gear I've owned:
RNC compressor - results: Hissy, no low end, no balanced IO.
Alesis 12R Board - results - a bad channel, not repairable.
RME Quadmic - results - One bad channel, cuts out, signal light always on. Not easily repairable.
Cascade M20 mic - results - hissy, won't take spl, colored off axis
Rolls hearphone amp - results - distorts easily.
Presonus MP20 - One channel of VU failed. Not worth much now.

..... and I could go on. The answer is that there is no middle ground. If you buy cheap stuff you will lose investment - but it can get you where you are going and that's good. If I took the sum of all that failed gear (now all worth 400 dollars combiined) on which I spent 1200 dollars over, and had bought a focusrite red second hand, it would still be worth about what I bought it for.

So: from a purely financial standpoint, buying cheap took a 66% loss, like the stock market crash of 1929. Buying true quality I own the gear for free for as long as I want. Pretty good deal, don't you think?

Anyone want to buy an MP20 with a non-working VU on one channel? .... I thought so.

KurtFoster Sun, 06/12/2005 - 10:31

Another reason for purchasing quality gear ... serviceability.

Everything no matter how well designed and built, will fail at some point.

A Focusrite Red or an old Neve ... a new GRMP2NV, Sebatron vmp or a Brick are all built with through the board construction. This means any qualified tech can repair a piece in the field if it fails. With LSI / SFM construction, all you can do is return the unit to the manufacturer and hope and pray they still have sub assemblies to replace your damaged ones. If there are none available or the product is no longer manufactured, you are most likely out of luck. Those of us who have been on the Merry Go Round for a while have all been trough this.

I bought a LA2a once for $50! It didn't work. There was burned tube socket and some wiring inside was burned as well. My "sevice guy" repaired the unit for me for $350 (5 hours bench time and parts) ... Try that with Behringer or an RNP. Fuggedaboudit!

anonymous Tue, 06/14/2005 - 06:48

Kurt wrote:

Another reason for purchasing quality gear ... serviceability.

Everything no matter how well designed and built, will fail at some point.

A Focusrite Red or an old Neve ... a new GRMP2NV, Sebatron vmp or a Brick are all built with through the board construction. This means any qualified tech can repair a piece in the field if it fails. With LSI / SFM construction, all you can do is return the unit to the manufacturer and hope and pray they still have sub assemblies to replace your damaged ones. If there are none available or the product is no longer manufactured, you are most likely out of luck. Those of us who have been on the Merry Go Round for a while have all been trough this.

I bought a LA2a once for $50! It didn't work. There was burned tube socket and some wiring inside was burned as well. My "sevice guy" repaired the unit for me for $350 (5 hours bench time and parts) ... Try that with Behringer or an RNP. Fuggedaboudit!

soooo......... TRUE

ferociousj Sat, 10/04/2008 - 12:19

Maybe I dont understand fully the applications of an interface, but I just don't understand how one mic input can really be of much use in the studio especially when recording drums... I'm referring to the brick's single mic input. I'm also very confused why most interfaces I find on musicians friend have only 2 inputs. For people who record drums, what interface are you using? I realize the Presonus has 8, i dont need 8. I need 4. There is an m-audio interface with 4 but it has terrible reviews across the board and that is the ONLY interface I could find with 4 inputs. Is there something I'm missing here? I got the impression that the job of an interface was to provide several inputs so you could record more than one track at once, so why in the hell is it either 2 or 8. Are those just the magic numbers when it comes to interfaces or something... very confused. I mean I understand the Brick probably has a very superior preamp to the pres in the PreSonus, but shit the PreSonus has EIGHT. Compared to ONE. And these interfaces are the same price? How the hell am I supposed to record a drumset with one mic input?

ferociousj Sat, 10/04/2008 - 20:11

Tell you what I just recorded a demo and Im happy with the way a lot of things turned out. Its very short and it was only to test how all the parts sounded together. This was done with one mic on the drums. The drums are a little muddy because the sound card in this laptop is fucking awful and i really didnt spend much time mixing but here it is:

http://www.myspace.com/picayunes

I really want to know what you guys think of this seeing how it seems to sound different on every computer you listen to it on. Also keep in mind that uploading it onto myspace compromises a lot of the quality and it sounds a lot muddier than it really it is.

Codemonkey Mon, 10/06/2008 - 20:07

Gecko, Greener...

I'm toying about. I made a recording of a concert and had the drum mic recorded separate. It was thrown up near the kit, I boosted some random frequencies and used a [="link removed[/]="link removed[/] which basically acts as a compressor.
Also I've changed it since then, I found that a bit of compression in the upper range was necessary. So, 3 plugins. Mostly compensating for a mic which has minimal response past 10KHz. Clip [[url=http://="http://www.soundcli…"]here[/]="http://www.soundcli…"]here[/].

But I think I had better results the week after that, I used a different mic in a different place. Unfortunately that got mashed into a stereo mix with vocals etc and I can't post just the drums.
I just post it over in [[url=http://[/URL]="http://recording.or…"]Critique[/]="http://recording.or…"]Critique[/] though.

soapfloats Fri, 01/16/2009 - 10:04

I have the Sytek, and along with the Focusrite ISA 428, it comprises my 8 "good" channels of mic pres.
It takes a lot of heat for having ICs.
That said, I like it. It seems a little "darker" than my Focusrite. In tracking it usually is dedicated to toms, snare bottom, and/or bass. (The Focusrite handles the kick, snare top, and OHs).
In addition to the ICs, there's no real gain meter, just a "clip" indicator.
You can get away with pushing it a little before making things sound bad.

In regards to the question about what to use the good pres on, I agree that you should start with the essentials of the drums. Guitars, bass, and vox can easily be overdubbed. Aside from that, refer to the most important aspect(s) of the particular song.

Anyone else have anything to add on the Sytek? Someone with more experience using it?

ocdstudios Fri, 03/19/2010 - 13:50

So there was a good question that needs answered. If you have a good rack pre but then run the output to a I/O device like a chaper firepod or Tascam (like I have) are you not defeating the purpose? You would still ruin your signal by putting through the crappy pre or AD coverters in you I/O box right? So how do you maintain that quality pre sound you just spent all that money to get all the way into the software and back out?

I am curious about this as i am considering a ZED16 because of this. If I spend money on a good piece of gear, like a good pre, I want to make sure there is not something else in my chain that is going to negate that quality gear I just purchased...

TheJackAttack Fri, 03/19/2010 - 21:16

I am curious about this as i am considering a ZED16 because of this. If I spend money on a good piece of gear, like a good pre, I want to make sure there is not something else in my chain that is going to negate that quality gear I just purchased...

Every connector, every piece of cable, every piece of kit that touches that signal path affects the signal. If you have quality or high end outboard then you should make sure that your cabling is not cheap stuff and the connectors on those cables are of good quality. I'm not saying you need a $2000 power cord. And yes they do exist.

As to the interface, make sure that it has some line inputs. Most small format boards these days don't actually have independent line inputs. They are really just attenuated circuits running through the onboard preamps. The common path around that is to use the insert points. This requires a special cable since most are wired Tip=Send Ring=Receive Shield=common. Now some small format mixers actually have quality preamps-the ZED R16, the Onyx i series to name a couple. You also want to make sure that the board doesn't add anything you don't intend it to add and again the fore mentioned brands do a good job at that. Alternatively you can purchase high quality stand alone converters and run into the Zed via ADAT. That said, unless you are gigging live or want to analog sum your ITB mix then you don't need a mixer. You just need an interface with the necessary number of inputs and outputs and quality AD/DA conversion.

ocdstudios Fri, 03/19/2010 - 22:17

Which is what I pretty much already knew from our conversation in the DAW forum and kind of my point in answering the question for the next guy that reads this looking for an answer.

There is no purpose in advising someone to buy a high-end stand alone Pre if they are going to run it through a crappy interface. From a budget standpoint it would be money better spent on the items you suggested like an interface with quality pre's in it.

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