What is the purpose of a mic preamp?

G

gulleyg

New member
I've been doing this home studio thing for a couple of years now and I've never really seen any information about the exact purpose of a mic preamp. Obviously they must be quite important as I see them mentioned time and time again on this and other websites and magazine articles, etc.

Can anyone enlighten me? What do they do? What are some important features to look for in a preamp? And then of course, what are some model recommendations for the budget concious home studio engineer? I understand the ART MP preamps are quite popular due to their prices. Any others?

GG
 
Just so that you are not confused... Without a preamp you will not be able to record with a mic. Most low budget recorders come with built in preamps. For example any 4-track recorder will have a mic preamp (or usually 4 mic preamps). The preamp is usually controlled by the first nob in the mixing path. When you turn the nob from "line" to "mic" you are essentially turning up the pre amp. If you buy a preamp (like the art tube) you can turn up that preamp and essentially turn off the other preamp (by turning it to "line" or all the way down)

Jeff
 
Hulley Gulleyg:

Like Hulley, a pre-amp, and there are many out there, can add the "MELLOW" to a vocal. Also, you can twiddle with the pre-amps Input and output to get even neater results without crashing the sound/distorting.

I put out a post recently that nobody answered and it dealt with the Martinsound Mic/Max. Martinsound is supposed to be one of the best out there but, so far, nobody seems to own one. I use a ART Pro two channel preamp and I use it to funnel syn sounds as well as vocals. It is a very creative and necessary tool unless you have a board withoutstanding pre-amps.

Keep twiddling the dials,

Green Hornet
 
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