Which Trident do you "love"?
For me personally, I always thought the A Range was perhaps the best sounding desk ever built.
But I am considerably less keen on the subsequent, IC based rather than discrete Class A, desks.
The TSM was decent sounding for what it was, but I never cared for the Series 80 or others.

So if *I* were you I'd look at the Geoff Daking line (which is strongly based on the A Range and have their exceptional pres and EQ) rather than at a 'lesser' (in my opinion) Trident model.

Here are some others to consider. Everyone feel free to give your experience:

MTA 980 Tony Larkin has one for sale, 3 years old, never been installed, Under $30k I believe. Not bad for a brand new 32 CH, 24 TRK console from Malcom Toft, one of THE Trident guys.

Quad Eight Virtuosso with moving fader auto. Not the same sonically, but good 70's-80's type sound.

John Oram's version of Trident console. It is an 80 series wannabe with 5.1 monitoring. Considerably more money.

Anyone?

I happen to know Michael and although some of the models mentioned are fine consoles....were talking in the area of $1k-$2k which really narrows the options down :)

Soo I guess taking into consideration that type of budget....

Hey Sceneria,

Yeah, he is right...I was looking at this 'cause I think I could get it for around there ($1K-$2k). I might just hold off..not sure yet. But if I can get a good deal on it I will take it. I found some mods to do to the console in regards to grounding and replacing some op amps which may help make it sound 'better'.

Overall I was asking if anyone has heard this console and if it sounds any better than say, a mackie or my soundtracs topaz.

Thanks for the responses so far though!

-Michael

Michael

I've been using a trident 65 (with 16 channels) for a while as my Mic-Pre. I know this sounds wierd - but the reason I'm doing that is b/c the preamps are awesome - but the board itself is aging and I don't want to spend the money to repair it. I do my actual mixing and outputs on a Mackie.

I'm very happy with the preamps and the awesome EQ strip on each channel. You'll read that the 65 has some headroom concerns - but I haven't found that with the preamps. I can crank them to 100% and there is still virtually no noise. Of course - if you overdrive anything you'll have headroom problems. Anyway - If you can get ahold of one at a good price you'll be happy with it.

Take care!
scott sends . . .

Originally posted by MichaelP:
Hi,

I have always wanted a Trident. BUT I don't have the $30,000 needed for one of the larger format consoles. I also really don't need anything bigger than 24 channels. I was thinking about getting a 16 channel board since I would use it to mainly track into my Pro Tools LE rig at home. I wanted the mic pre's and the EQ's that came with the board. Maybe do some sub-mixing back through it, etc, but stay mainly in the digital world.

Anyway, I was wondering what everyone's thoughts were on the Trident Series 65. I am looking into one of these since I think I may be able to get good deal on one.

Thanks!
Michael

The mechanical construction leaves a lot to be desired:

• IIRC, it uses Molex-type connectors for the modules that have a very high extraction force causing undue damage to your appendages and other objects in the vicinity.
• I thought the build quality of the sheetmetal work, pots, knobs, switches, etc. could have been much better. I believe that the pots were ALPS...a high volume pot manufacturer. Getting replacements may be hard unless there's a second source (not typically). You will have to replace pots eventually. At least the switches are second/triple sourced!
• The two that I worked with had power supply reliability issues. On one, we finally just re-built it and the problems went away.

The "Plus" side: the EQ sounds nice. Don't replace the TL074s in the EQ section with something else...it actually ruins the sound.