Joe Meek Twin Q Advice? Thanks for opinions...

B

Billigan

New member
Right now I am recording through an Mbox, and I also have an older Roland VS1680 that I primarily use as a keyboard mixer.

I have been thinking about getting a 2 channel mike pre / channel strip that also has spdif out so that I can bypass the convertors on the Mbox, or on the Roland for that matter should I use it to record with again at some time in the future.

I have a few reasons for wanting a 2 channel pre....processing keyboards, dual mic'ing guitars, etc. Right now my only pre other than what's in the Mbox is an FMR RNP which is dual channel, and I have an RNC for compression like a lot of you probably had or have. The microphones I currently own are an SP C3, a Rode NT4 Stereo, AKG 451b, and a couple of 57's.

At my price point ( sub 1k ) this obviously led me to the new Joe Meek Twin Q. Since the new one has not been out that long, do you think...

1. That the convertors on the Joe Meek will be much better than what is already in my Mbox? I really don't have anything to compare the Mbox convertors to.

2. That the Joe Meek Twin Q will sound better / different than the RNP / RNC combo I have now?

I mostly screw around with classic rock stuff, but am the first to admit that I am just a guy recording all of the instruments himself in a semi-treated bonus room.
The Joe Meek appeals to me in that it as 2 complete strips with pre, eq, and comp, as well as the digital out. I had a Great River 1NV awhile back, and it was great, but
it was going through the Mbox convertors, so maybe the new Meek would be better for a guy like me.

I appreciate your opinions. I have seen some user comments on the Twin Q and they looked positive. I guess to recap, do you guys think it's worth dropping 800.00 over what I already have?
 
As you can see below, the jury is out for right now as the digital out from the TwinQ is causing unbearable hiss.


Edit - there is the possibility that I'm doing this incorrectly but it is diminishing very rapidly. The analog output works flawlessly and sounds very good.
 
Thanks for pointing me to your post!

Do you have the brand new Twin Q, or the older one?

The first thing I ever "spideffed" ( is that a word ?) to my Mbox was the digital output of a Vetta guitar amp. It had a lot of hiss, and a whining type sound in the background also that I never was able to get rid of. If this is an indication of what I may be getting myself into, I may just forego the channel strip with a digital out route. Not that the channel strips are of bad design... for all I know it was my Mbox.

Sorry you are dealing with this. Pls post the outcome as there are probably other folks comtemplating using a Twin Q like you are trying to do who could benefit from your ongoing evaluations. Thx.
 
Did you guys sync the units in any way? If you run Mbox/Protools on internal clock and the SPDIF unit on it's own clock you will definetly have problems, even if they're both set to 44.1k or whatever. Clocks run off of a resonator or crystal and there are tolerance issues and 44.1k may be 44.100000001 k on one unit and 44.99999999 k on the other, so you'll never be able to get the 2 units to talk correctly unless you make one the master and slave the other to the master clock. With the Protools LE systems, there's no dedicated sync, so you'll have to designate the clock source within Protools as "SPDIF" instead of internal clock. It's in the Setups>Hardware Setups menu in the lower left.
 
You know, I think I did this, but now that you brought it up, I will retry the Vetta digital out to the Mbox digital and check it out again. Thanks for the tip. I am still really just trying to determine if a digital capable channel strip is worthwhile for me.
 
reshp1 said:
Did you guys sync the units in any way? If you run Mbox/Protools on internal clock and the SPDIF unit on it's own clock you will definetly have problems, even if they're both set to 44.1k or whatever. Clocks run off of a resonator or crystal and there are tolerance issues and 44.1k may be 44.100000001 k on one unit and 44.99999999 k on the other, so you'll never be able to get the 2 units to talk correctly unless you make one the master and slave the other to the master clock. With the Protools LE systems, there's no dedicated sync, so you'll have to designate the clock source within Protools as "SPDIF" instead of internal clock. It's in the Setups>Hardware Setups menu in the lower left.
Click to expand...

Brand new TwinQ.

The TwinQ and the MOTU 896HD are hooked up correctly and communicate at 96k. The noise happens even when the input and output gain is turned all the way down on the Twin Q.

-Creep
 
I agree... but...

Ive had exactly the same problem with my new twinq... tested it for some time, irritated by the hiss. Turned the unit off and back on again while it was still connected and low and behold it went. I speak the truth! Occassionally it goes back to its old ways and the same solution seems to work. In my case its maybe some static build up or the likes, who knows.
 
sub 1k I think a better option would be 2 used grace 101 mic preamps. Meeks stuff can be noisy and very cold sounding. (at least from my exp.) I think grace designs makes a two channel as well (not sure of the price). Excellent preamps. I've used pairs of 101's on synths, Stero mic pairs, guitars direct just about everythig. (they are also very portable.)
 
regarding the twin q

If you have not decided, i can tell you that the twin q works great as a a to d. i have used it with digi 001 and with box. the noise that some people were mentioning is likely due to mismatch sample rates. it is critical that you select the appropriate sample rate on the twin q. it does not automatch to your software. I find the best result comes when you slave your daw to the input clock of the twin q.

Try it, it works wonderfully.


Peace,
Michael k.
 
youngmichaelk said:
If you have not decided, i can tell you that the twin q works great as a a to d. i have used it with digi 001 and with box. the noise that some people were mentioning is likely due to mismatch sample rates. it is critical that you select the appropriate sample rate on the twin q. it does not automatch to your software. I find the best result comes when you slave your daw to the input clock of the twin q.

Try it, it works wonderfully.


Peace,
Michael k.
Click to expand...

Except that it wasn't, and it isn't, and it still dosen't work.
 
nonovice said:
sub 1k I think a better option would be 2 used grace 101 mic preamps. Meeks stuff can be noisy and very cold sounding. (at least from my exp.) I think grace designs makes a two channel as well (not sure of the price). Excellent preamps. I've used pairs of 101's on synths, Stero mic pairs, guitars direct just about everythig. (they are also very portable.)
Click to expand...


Please read more carefully in the future. He wants digital outs so he can bypass the mbox converters. The 101's are all analog. Great pre's, great recommendation just the wrong thread. What about something from Apogee, like the mini me, I think it may have compression and some sort of limiting along with converters and some decent pre's. I'd think it'd be a much better option than the twin Q.
 
My brand new TwinQ works great, and the SPDIF is flawless and quiet. I don't know what could be going on with your units, but mine is awesome. The pre is not cold sounding at all... to my ears its thicker and warmer than all my other pres. The EQ is decent and the compressor sounds great. I reccomend the TwinQ.
 
Mine is brand new and is flawless... I use the digital outs into my Onyx digital in. No hiss, no problems. This is a really good pre. However.... I just bought a new Presonus ADL 600, so I will be selling this in the next week. Nothing at all wrong with it, but I simply don't need it. I have it listed in the want ad section. If you listen to my songs, they were tracked using this pre for every single part except drums which are loops.
I gotta tell ya, this is the coolest looking box too!
 
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