kcatthedog
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Post by kcatthedog on Dec 9, 2022 2:03:45 GMT -6
Was researching this and found this sos neve review. www.soundonsound.com/reviews/neve-8803?ampDo people know of other gear like this? I know the bettermaker eq ( pultec) has digital recall, but what about others ? Thx! |
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Post by jeremygillespie on Dec 9, 2022 5:08:59 GMT -6
SSL logic rack and the Wes Audio stuff can do this. I’ve honestly always stayed away away from hardware with digital control as half of what your paying for is the control, and at some point it will stop working or the way it interfaces will be aged out.
Eq is the easiest outboard to recall. Just send a tone into the box at whatever frequency you’re boosting or cutting at -20. Toggle the gear in and out of bypass and write down how much you’re boosting or cutting. Do that for each frequency that you’re effecting and you have a perfect recall every time.
The only 2 pieces this hasn’t been perfect for me in the past were the graphic api’s and these old school Langevin eq’s with the sliders on them. The way the bands interact with one another and the loose tolerances on the sliders made it almost impossible to get a recall happening with them. I always printed those back into the box to keep from having to deal with that particular headache.
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ericn
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Post by ericn on Dec 9, 2022 7:06:58 GMT -6
Recall on outboard seams like a great idea until you realize there is no standard protocol so you are completely at the whims of the manufacturer. Over the years there have been a bunch who have offered it, the reason you don’t see them is in most cases the recall feature is now useless unless you want an ancient cpu running an ancient program to support a couple of pieces at most.
It’s just like console automation, except then a orphaned computer makes sense.
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Post by Bat Lanyard on Dec 9, 2022 8:15:13 GMT -6
SSL logic rack and the Wes Audio stuff can do this. I’ve honestly always stayed away away from hardware with digital control as half of what your paying for is the control, and at some point it will stop working or the way it interfaces will be aged out. That's exactly the conclusion I ended up with on the ngBusComp. Totally beautiful unit but overall I didn't feel it sounded as good as the price would suggest. Didn't sound bad at all, just didn't blow me away on the 2-bus. For a third of the price I could get the same results. |
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Post by jmoose on Dec 9, 2022 17:48:07 GMT -6
SSL logic rack and the Wes Audio stuff can do this. I’ve honestly always stayed away away from hardware with digital control as half of what your paying for is the control, and at some point it will stop working or the way it interfaces will be aged out. Yes indeed... the SSL Logic rack they don't support anymore has instant recall. Too bad because IMO it was a superior platform. The market decided it wanted cheaper, 500 series boxes with no recall so there 'ya go right? But sure there have been attempts over the years to make analog outboard with digital control and recall. Its not a new concept. Distressor is digitally controlled analog and that's been around for decades... Reason why most never took hold is because the software/computer side always burns out way before the gadget ever does. Built in obsolescence. See this more often today with iOS & Android devices. Especially in the guitar world... where the gadget is only useful as long as you can program it from whatever generation of phone 'ya got. Oh that Lame6 box was great, but could only be programmed with an iphone 6 or earlier? So now its junk? Truthfully I love digital EQ. Love it to pieces. Run UAD eq all day long on anything & everything. Best thing about digital EQ is the instant recall. As someone who grew up jotting down all 56 channels of EQ on a desk? Each one 4 band parametric + filters? For every song & mix revision?! And now its not even a thought?! Dude. Its a modern miracle. Love digital EQ but I also love analog EQ. Have several channels and I'm gonna buy a few more next year. And they get used for mixing too not just tracking. Most of my analog EQ boxes tend to be simple, broad stroke things. How hard is it to take recall notes on a pultec? There's 2 bands, only a couple knobs. Other things like the Daking 52270 have fixed freq points... click stops. So not many variables there either. One of the easiest/fastest analog EQ's to manually recall is the API 550. Everything is on click stop. As long as you dig the frequency choices & can live with 2dB steps? Golden. |
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Post by Blackdawg on Dec 9, 2022 20:48:21 GMT -6
Tegeler is the other big brand with controllable hardware.
As much as I want that kind of stuff to succeed and work out great. You are still at the mercy of software which comes and goes so fast. Thankfully most of these piece function just fine without the plugin, you just loose out on the nice automation and recall.
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Post by thehightenor on Dec 11, 2022 10:51:52 GMT -6
SSL logic rack and the Wes Audio stuff can do this. I’ve honestly always stayed away away from hardware with digital control as half of what your paying for is the control, and at some point it will stop working or the way it interfaces will be aged out. That's exactly the conclusion I ended up with on the ngBusComp. Totally beautiful unit but overall I didn't feel it sounded as good as the price would suggest. Didn't sound bad at all, just didn't blow me away on the 2-bus. For a third of the price I could get the same results. I love the idea of the Wes Audio gear but when I listen to it I'm not totally convinced, but that's only clips on the interwho. The thing is, the way the designer implements the digital control is every single element passes through a VCA. So for example the Wes Audio Hyperion uses no fewer than 18 THAT 2162 and 2181 VCAs in each channel to enable accurate digital control. It's a stereo unit so that's 36 VCA's. I do use a stereo VCA stereo compressor on my stereo bus with THAT VCA's in it - but still I do wonder what impact all the VCA's are having on nothing more than 1 single stereo EQ perhaps it's truly irrelevant, but it has put me off in the past when I was considering buying in to their 500 series system. It's the exact opposite design philosophy to (for example) my Thermionic Swift EQ that prides itself on having no IC's anywhere in the circuit. Functionality wise the Wes Audio gear is stunning. |
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Post by drbill on Dec 11, 2022 13:33:12 GMT -6
There WAS a time where people wanted NO VCA's in the signal path other than compressors. Neve Flying Faders come to mind. People were willing to spend $50,000-100,000 to keep VCA's at bay (SSL) - ONE per mono channel. And now my EQ has 18 per channel? I get that VCA's have a tone we have become accustomed to, but there is somewhere a line in the sand.....
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Post by Blackdawg on Dec 11, 2022 23:15:31 GMT -6
There WAS a time where people wanted NO VCA's in the signal path other than compressors. Neve Flying Faders come to mind. People were willing to spend $50,000-100,000 to keep VCA's at bay (SSL) - ONE per mono channel. And now my EQ has 18 per channel? I get that VCA's have a tone we have become accustomed to, but there is somewhere a line in the sand..... why the Tegeler stuff is interesting. Motorized pots. |
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Post by thehightenor on Dec 12, 2022 1:32:48 GMT -6
There WAS a time where people wanted NO VCA's in the signal path other than compressors. Neve Flying Faders come to mind. People were willing to spend $50,000-100,000 to keep VCA's at bay (SSL) - ONE per mono channel. And now my EQ has 18 per channel? I get that VCA's have a tone we have become accustomed to, but there is somewhere a line in the sand..... why the Tegeler stuff is interesting. Motorized pots. Which is in effect the approach of Access Analog. What I need is an assistant Then all my gear becomes automated  |
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Post by svart on Dec 12, 2022 9:59:18 GMT -6
It's more likely that digitally controlled hardware uses digital potentiometers for the EQ circuits. VCAs are commonly paralleled in quantity to reduce their distortion, so that generally accounts for devices that use a lot of them.
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Post by plinker on Dec 12, 2022 10:50:13 GMT -6
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