Apogee Mini-Me clipping too easily...

R

rokko

New member
Hi everyone. I've recently bought a second hand Apogee mini me which i find a very fine piece of harwdware except for the problem i've been facing lately. I'm using the onboard mic pre-amps with the following LD mics: AT4050, KSM44, GT66, C414BULS and the Mini Me pre-amps clip before any over indication in the meters and maybe a couple of dBs before reaching 0dbfs (soft limit and compression curve 2 engaged). So recording turns into a very painful practice as i can't actually predict when the preamp in going to clip or distort. This happened recording not very loud sources (vocals mostly)... so i can't imagine the mini me handling loud sources such as percussion or amps.
There's the option to pad the inputs by 18dbs but it requires to open the unit and to permanently switch 4 sets of jumpers, which isn't exactly handy.
Do you think this is a normal behavior for a relatively expensive box like this? What can i loose using the lower gain settting? Will it be wiser to use mics level attenuation?

Thanx in advance for your help.
 
I don't own the unit, juts always wanted one. So I'm not sure that what you're experiencing is normal. If you pad it down internally does that take of the clipping? Can you get a hold of external pad and test it out? You know, one of those in-line Shures or something like that? Have you tried any dynamic mics yet?
 
rokko said:
Do you think this is a normal behavior for a relatively expensive box like this?
Click to expand...

rokko-

Here's a review, basically it says yes, this piece can be overloaded pretty easily by certain mics and sources. It also says despite that, it's worth it.

http://www.mojopie.com/minime.html

I'd probably get inline pads like riffy said, 18db is a lot of gain to give up semi-permanently if you plan to record a bunch of different sources with different mics. I have a couple of 1 foot mic cables to use with the pads I have, to keep the strain off the connectors on my mixer and prevent mishaps. They are a few inches long, and when you connect them to a mic cable, the pad plus connector on the cable is 5-6 inches long. Very easy to have an expensive accident.
 
I have a MiniMe that I use frequently - I have to admit that I rarely ever turn the preamp gain louder than "all the way down" - Which is fine. If I'm peaking above -30dBFS or so, that's plenty of signal. But I've had situations where even "all the way down" is a bit much - Louder instrumentation, orchestras, etc., where the signal starts peaking at -8dBFS or so - That's too hot.

Personally, I'd go into the unit and buffer the input if it allows it (I never really bothered to check, but maybe now I will - so thanks for the tip, eh?).

Still, see how it works with the gain all the way down. If you're signal is riding around line level (around -20 or -18dBFS, give or take), it's working exactly as it's supposed to.

EDIT - Just re-read - I'd turn off the soft-limit compression - That's probably where all that crazy gain is comimg from. The SoftLimit as a "safety net" when recording live or something is fine - But when you can actually get a level check, you shouldn't be getting the signal anywhere *near* where the limiter is going to catch anything. If you are, you're most definitely recording WAY too hot. If turning the gain all the way down doesn't bring it to a "normal" level (again, around -18dBFS is a nice target to keep the "meat" of the signal) then flip the jumpers so you have a little more wiggle room.
 
I'm confused... Is it clipping on the input? (which I thought was the case), or too hot on the output...

If it's overloading, pad the input... and I agree... 18 dB sounds like a lot of noise floor to loose (semi-permanently), I'd pad the input... or switch in the pads on the mic... if available...

I think we're discussing two topics in the same thread.. ins and outs
 
I know many Preamps have the Gain set useing a Variable resistor on the Circuit board which you should be able to adjust to lower the Overall Gain of the Preamp, There is also the 4 Jumpers you mentioned so It might be a Good Idea to take off the screws and open the thing up and see if you can change the Jumpers settings (It should not be permanant) or adjust the Variable resistor to lower the Gain (If it has one)......


Just a Thought!!!
 
Hi everyone again and thanx for your responses. Well, first thing this morning I tried again an AT4050 with the Mini-Me. To my surprise as soon as i disengaged the soft limit i realized the input was overloading badly. So a good practice should be indeed to set levels with the soft limit off as you don't actually know when you're overloading the input or the soft limit circuit it self. Metering shows signal after the soft limit/compression (i thought it was an input meter... i was too lazy to read the manual or just turn off the soft limit to verify this... too bad).
Anyway it's pretty easy to overload the mini-me so some padding is really needed for increased versatility. Loosing 18dbs almost permanently is not a good thing indeed, so i guess i'll be using mic pads a bit more than before.
Other than that i'm really pleased with the sound of this Apogee unit. Bye!
 
If you're clipping the thing with the gain all the way down, losing 18dB isn't going down very much... Clipping is *already* 18dB over nominal. Losing the 18 is only bringing it down to a more "normal" level.

That's one of those freaky things about the MiniMe... The meters are reading dBFS if I'm not mistaken (mine isn't here right now). As long as the bottom light goes on relatively steadily, the signal is *plenty* hot.
 
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