ANybody here think High End Pre's are Overrated?

  • Thread starter Thread starter MadMax
  • Start date Start date
Soundmind?? said:
As a somewhat newbie, but learning all the time, I'm beginning to appreciate these arguments more and more. A year ago I would have argued that there is little difference. Now that I've bought and compared good gear (Avalon, Mindprint, Apogee, etc) with lower cost products I can tell you that there is a clear difference, especially when 4 or 5 or more tracks are mixed. I also hear things on older recordings that went unnoticed before. I hear noises that I used to be oblivious to. The sound of my HVAC seems much louder than it used to. I guess this is the "trained ears" we read about. Am I at a truly professional level yet? By no means, but every session teaches me something as well as reading these forums.

The point is, we can deny the things we can't hear, but once your ears have been opened, the truth is revealed, and it is undeniable. High end gear is necessary for the best results possible. Good sound is not guaranted, only truly faithful reproduction to the sound recorded.
Click to expand...

I don’t think anyone here has argued that there IS are difference, the argument being is there TOO much HYPE. Or I guess it was a question as to is there too much hype. As one that has cheap and class A mic preamps I have many times, as I have stated before, compared them side-by-side. There is no "blow your hair back, oh my god I can’t believe the difference" reaction. It’s like comparing an sm57 and an U47.Yes there is a difference but it is subtle. I think it is easy to state that if you do not think there is a lot of hype in mic preamps it is because your ears have not developed yet or the talent isn’t there to ascertain the difference. As Les Paul said "people hear with their eyes". I think a bit of this is true. I propse a test. Lets have people post sample of same spoken passage with different mic pre's. From class A to cheapie to mid-range.Samples should be not labled. Lets see how many people can state what sample came from what preamp. I think only the people with class A mic pre's should be involved. Does tis sound interesting? By the way, I mean this as a friendly "test". A scientific study if you will. :)
 
Last edited:
jmorris said:
I don’t think anyone here has argued that there IS are difference, the argument being is there TOO much HYPE. Or I guess it was a question as to is there too much hype. As one that has cheap and class A mic preamps I have many times, as I have stated before, compared them side-by-side. There is no "blow your hair back, oh my god I can’t believe the difference" reaction. It’s like comparing an sm57 and an U47.Yes there is a difference but it is subtle. I think it is easy to state that if you do not think there is a lot of hype in mic preamps it is because your ears have not developed yet or the talent isn’t there to ascertain the difference. As Les Paul said "people hear with their eyes". I think a bit of this is true. I propse a test. Lets have people post sample of same spoken passage with different mic pre's. From class A to cheapie to mid-range.Samples should be not labled. Lets see how many people can state what sample came from what preamp. I think only the people with class A mic pre's should be involved. Does tis sound interesting? By the way, I mean this as a friendly "test". A scientific study if you will. :)
Click to expand...

First of all, this has been done many times over at gearslutz (thought I would save everyone some time, do a search on preamps over there and you will be kept busy for a month or two) and there a considerable difference between under $500/channel preamps and say a $2000 dollar preamp and above. You can't duplicate it with plug ins but you can disguise it in a dense mix. For a stand out vocal there is no substitute. As an alternative, for $35 you can get Lynn Furston's preamp shootout CD.
 
. You can't duplicate it with plug ins but you can disguise it in a dense mix. For a stand out vocal there is no substitute. As an alternative, for $35 you can get Lynn Furston's preamp shootout CD.[/QUOTE]
I'm not talking comparing a vocal track buried in a mix with 36 tracks to compete with. I'm saying if I read a passage of a book, say 15 seconds long with my V72a preamp, then with same mic, cable, room etc. with a mid range mic preamp( or even a cheaper one) the result will not be astoundingly different as has been suggested and I will give odds 49 out of 50 people here could not guess the correct source. No offense to anyone here. My point being(again) there is a lot of hype with highend mic pre's. Are they good? yes, are good pre's an important part of a good recording,yes,but as stated many times here by many people its only 1 part of the mix( so to speak :p ) Is a 1959 les paul sunburst worth $300,000.00? No! well that is what they are selling for on todays vintage market. There is a tremendous amount of hype with vintage guitars. I have stated in other post I have owned and played almost every
"'vintage" guitar out there. My '59 burst I played 1 time, it was ok, put it in the case and sold it. I was at one time sucked in by the whole vintage thing, that they were better sounding, better made etc. It is the player that makes the sound 90% of the time. I think the same thing applies to micpre's. Think of it this was, a Neve 1073 will run you about $7000.00 for a racked pair I think. Is it 10-15 times better than an Aphex 207? No, is there a difference, yes, would the difference be hype? Yes
 
jmorris said:
. You can't duplicate it with plug ins but you can disguise it in a dense mix. For a stand out vocal there is no substitute. As an alternative, for $35 you can get Lynn Furston's preamp shootout CD.
Click to expand...
I'm not talking comparing a vocal track buried in a mix with 36 tracks to compete with. I'm saying if I read a passage of a book, say 15 seconds long with my V72a preamp, then with same mic, cable, room etc. with a mid range mic preamp( or even a cheaper one) the result will not be astoundingly different as has been suggested and I will give odds 49 out of 50 people here could not guess the correct source. ]

The point I'm making is that the difference may be subtle with a single track, especially with someone reading, but the difference will be clear with more complex sounds such as acoustical instruments or dense mixes, which is where the hype usually is focused. It think there is some truth that marketing over hypes high end gear, but then again, I've never read an add selling cheap gear listing it's limitations. Most cheap gear is listed as "pro" which is somewhat of a stretch.
 
what?
that quote got all screwed up. Look at post above, That was not my quote and response was mine! Whats up?
 
Seems that my quote getter didn't get the quote I wanted it to, edited the post, the first paragraph is also a quote, obviously!
 
Funny as I have this conversation with a friend of mine who is very good friends with a VERY famous mixer/engineer. We all grew up in same town. This "famous guy" works with Claptom, Streisand( or however your spell her name) M. Jackson. We talked about mic preamps and Mic's. About the hype of each and are they REALLY woth it. My friend had a vintage U47 in beautiful condition. They ( my friend and "famous guy")were comparing it to an sm57. He said, yeah, there is a difference but not 700 time the price worth. Same thing with preamps and console EQ's. SSL eq's to be exact. The "famous guy" all but said he did not hear a hell of a lot of difference either. This "famous guys" name is Mick and I dont mean Jaggar. I tend to think he has ears and knows what he's talking about.
 
Soundmind?? said:
Seems that my quote getter didn't get the quote I wanted it to, edited the post, the first paragraph is also a quote, obviously!
Click to expand...
Yeah, It was wacky! :p
 
Middleman said:
First of all, this has been done many times over at gearslutz (thought I would save everyone some time, do a search on preamps over there and you will be kept busy for a month or two) and there a considerable difference between under $500/channel preamps and say a $2000 dollar preamp and above. You can't duplicate it with plug ins but you can disguise it in a dense mix. For a stand out vocal there is no substitute. As an alternative, for $35 you can get Lynn Furston's preamp shootout CD.
Click to expand...
Middleman,
are you willing to take the test if I post examples? I mean if it is so obvious that the highend pre's stand out it should be a breeze, right?
 
jmorris said:
Funny as I have this conversation with a friend of mine who is very good friends with a VERY famous mixer/engineer. We all grew up in same town. This "famous guy" works with Claptom, Streisand( or however your spell her name) M. Jackson. We talked about mic preamps and Mic's. About the hype of each and are they REALLY woth it. My friend had a vintage U47 in beautiful condition. They ( my friend and "famous guy")were comparing it to an sm57. He said, yeah, there is a difference but not 700 time the price worth. Same thing with preamps and console EQ's. SSL eq's to be exact. The "famous guy" all but said he did not hear a hell of a lot of difference either. This "famous guys" name is Mick and I dont mean Jaggar. I tend to think he has ears and knows what he's talking about.
Click to expand...

I would agree that the difference may not be major in every case. I have stated before that there may be some snobbery as well as some jealousy contributing to the argument. I know that I have personally A/B'd some of my gear and can hear enough difference to justify the price I payed for them. If I didn't believe it, I'd have a couple of racks full of cheap gear. The hundreds of knobs and meters and the 40 or 50 channels would look impressive, but I wouldn't get the improvement I've wanted.
 
MadMax said:
I'm tempted to buy one, but I've never used one. And so far, my A&H Mixwiz sounds fine. But am I missing something? I have a feeling, based on the endless threads out there that a pre that costs about twice what a mic costs will make about 5% difference in the sound. And then you have to decide if that 5% is good, bad, or just different.
So waht I want to know is if there's anybody who knows what they're talking about who bought a $2000 mic pre and was disappointed.

I suspect it's kinda like the old Emperor's new clothes thing.
Click to expand...
Madmax, I just noticed the emperor's clothes comment. I think you are right on the money with that one as far the people here that think "if you cant tell the difference you lack experience or talent". Is a 2x4 piece of lumber a fantastic shelter in the cold? No, not by iteslf, but put 2000 2x4's together, cut the proper length and with the right angles and you have a house. My 3 Octopree's at 900 bucks each( 8 channels) comes out to a little over 100 bucks per channel. My V72a's rackrd are 2500 bucks. Thats 1250.00 per channel. Thats 12 times the cost of the Octopre per channel. It is in no way, shape or form 12 times better,hard to really say what percentage it is better 3%/5%,therefore the logical end would be the V72a's cost is a result of HYPE.
 
I would say the depth of field, the sonic clarity throughout the frequency range, the quality of the signal separation, the firmness of the bass frequencies of your V72's vs. the Octopres is probably in the neighborhood of X 12. Thats assuming you would give a grade on each of the acoustic qualities I just mentioned. It might only be a X 2 or an X 3 here and there, but combined its what the discussion is all about.

Objective story: A couple months ago, I recorded some vocal tracks ...lets call em pre-production tracks...for our new project we're starting. This a full length album. I used a very nice ADK TT condenser tube mic. It fit the vocalists voice to a tee. I thought nothing could be better. Recently I re-aquired an older U87 I had used years ago for much recording. I ran it through the same setup as the TT and since everything was on the same harddisk, was able to flip back and forth between solo'd vocal takes for comparison. Many similarities due to environment, vocalist, equipment in general. NO comparison to that 'special' thing the Neumann has going on. A firmness, an evenness, everything was there in spades. And I LOVE that TT mic. I'll still use it...Its incredible on the guitars....just not on the vocals. Its that little something that the next step up in gear brings to the table.
 
cavedog101 said:
I would say the depth of field, the sonic clarity throughout the frequency range, the quality of the signal separation, the firmness of the bass frequencies of your V72's vs. the Octopres is probably in the neighborhood of X 12. Thats assuming you would give a grade on each of the acoustic qualities I just mentioned. It might only be a X 2 or an X 3 here and there, but combined its what the discussion is all about.

Objective story: A couple months ago, I recorded some vocal tracks ...lets call em pre-production tracks...for our new project we're starting. This a full length album. I used a very nice ADK TT condenser tube mic. It fit the vocalists voice to a tee. I thought nothing could be better. Recently I re-aquired an older U87 I had used years ago for much recording. I ran it through the same setup as the TT and since everything was on the same harddisk, was able to flip back and forth between solo'd vocal takes for comparison. Many similarities due to environment, vocalist, equipment in general. NO comparison to that 'special' thing the Neumann has going on. A firmness, an evenness, everything was there in spades. And I LOVE that TT mic. I'll still use it...Its incredible on the guitars....just not on the vocals. Its that little something that the next step up in gear brings to the table.
Click to expand...
Cavedog, so if I were to post 3 samples you could tell me which on was recorded with the V72a's? I have a 1969 U87 and I have been through the same type of discussion about Neumann mic's as with highend pre's. I do not argue if they are better, just the fact they are not THAT much better, leading me to the asignment of the term hype.
 
"NO comparison to that 'special' thing the Neumann has going on. A firmness, an evenness, everything was there in spades. And I LOVE that TT mic. I'll still use it...Its incredible on the guitars....just not on the vocals. Its that little something that the next step up in gear brings to the table."
See, that is what I'm talking about. Hype comes_from people willing to pay 12 fold for a little extra something.That would be defined as HYPE. Look, as we all know that Neumann looks very cools as we all grew up see it on every studio shot from Beatles to present. There is a kind of vibe with those mic's. Remember, I'll say it again for Les Paul,"people hear with there eyes". I own as I have said a very cool U87( 1969) I bought from The Hit Factory as they closed down. It would have been used in every session from Lennon in 1980 to Paul Simons Graceland and Springsteen's Blood brothers. Its a very cool mic just for its history. Is it along the signle best mic in the world.NO, Is it worth 20 times an sm57, hell no, but I payed to get it. Why? Vibe,hype, history.
 
So what do you think?

Okay all...

I am getting some valuable information from this discussion and I am glad I waited before buying my A&H Mix Wizard or GL2400 and a pair of AT AE2500 mics.

Here's my situation:

1. Not a professional...just do this for a hobby with a friend.
2. Recorded a CD before that came out okay (almost good enough for what I wanted). I wanted more of a fuller, beefier, WIDER stereo sound.

Here's my equipment:

A mackie VLZ 1402 board (6 inputs) and a Behringer tube pre (2 inputs) for a total of 8 inputs simultaneously. I have 8 drum mics I use: SM57's for snare and all the toms, 2 AKGC1000s' for overheads, and a Shure bass drum mic (don't remember which one).

For vocals I use a Blue baby bottle.

I also use a dbx166XL for a compressor/gate...works nice on the drums...not too happy with it on the vocals...it distorts a little and isn't very smooth...thinking of getting an Art VLA.

The room I record in is a basement with carpeting and lots of furniture, etc. It is NOT acoustically treated. I don't know if i want to spend the time or the money either because it's just a hack studio room.

What I would like do is:

1. Get a bass drum trigger and sound module to get that famous sharp "tick-tick" sound so that every note is heard evenly and double bass parts come out really nicely. (think Pantera's Vulgar Display of Power bass drum sounds or Metallica's Justice bass drum sounds). I've been to a few clubs that were doing it and the sound guys said it was a trigger....but I never asked him what brands of sound module, etc. I have a boss DR something (top unit 2 years ago...dark blue in color??) I don't know if I can use this unit to trigger bass drum sounds....

2. Get a good board/pre's if it's worth it...probably not in my particular case.

3. Purchase Audio Technica AE2500's for use on my stereo guitar rig (Boogie gear) instead of the SM57's to get more of a thicker, fuller sound.

4. Are there stand alone in line phase reversal switches for stereo recording?

The computer I am using is old but doesn't give me any problems. I am running Logic Platinum 6 with Waves plug-ins and a MOTU 1296 front end. I use the Waves Ultramaximizer+ for overall level boosting before I output the final recording.

For monitors I use Event 8's (forget the model)...they're powered.

Any suggestions would be helpful as I have money to spend but don't want to waste it at the same time.

Thanks...again, I'm glad I'm reading thru these forums because I think my money can be better spent now....:)

-Ed
 
Yes, but is it worth 20 times more than an sm57 when you have a good client that wants the best sound they can have? I would say that yes, it most certainly is:)
 
Like xstatic said, for commercial sales, bling is a factor that has no real audio value but has a powerful effect on the customer. If someone is paying x dollars per hour to record their trash, are they gonna want to plunk it down in a place with an M-box and a little Behringer mixer or someplace with a Harrison Model 10?A SPC3 as the main mic or a Neumann? It doesnt matter about the sound differences in some cases.
 
I think a better question than whether high end pres are overrated is the question of what is the RIGHT GEAR for the sound you are going for. That gear might be very expensive or not bad at all depending on the type of recordings you like.

In my case, it's vintage country--think Carter Family, Hank Williams Sr. So, I bought an AEA R84 ($900--not so bad), and have ordered a Groove Tubes suPRE ($1200--they're plenty more expensive two channel preamps out there). I also picked up a Fostex A2 quarter-inch reel-to-reel on ebay. ($250). Is this the PERFECT GEAR for my sound? Probably not. Probably should get an RCA 77 but those go for a fortune on EBAY, and I probably should get a real old high gain vintage tube preamp but I'm afraid of it breaking. Are there better mics than the R84 and preamps than the Groove Tubes suPRE? Probably, but for the sound I'm going for it should be more than fine...........

Hope I haven't hijacked the thread. But what good is the Neuman Solution D mic for $10,000 if it doesn't suit the type of music you want to record????
 
re: Hey!

How about for that big in your face punchy sound for rock?

Looking at the Great River MP-2NV, the Vintech 272 (I like the price), Sytek MPX-4Aii w/Burr-Brown Chs. 3-4, etc.

Any suggestions? I've heard people bashing the Vintech 272, etc.

-Ed
 
I don't think that's quite what Xstatic was getting at......
cavedog101 said:
Like xstatic said, for commercial sales, bling is a factor that has no real audio value but has a powerful effect on the customer. If someone is paying x dollars per hour to record their trash, are they gonna want to plunk it down in a place with an M-box and a little Behringer mixer or someplace with a Harrison Model 10?A SPC3 as the main mic or a Neumann? It doesnt matter about the sound differences in some cases.
Click to expand...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top