First, Seeker, you need to understand that preamps are everywhere. If you have a mixer, or an audio interface, you already own a preamp. Now, go figger- If an 8 channel $60 Behringer mixer has 8 preamps in it (one per channel), and say half of the price of the mixer is the preamps, and they mark up the mixer 100% for retail sale, what did those preamps cost? Answer- They cost the manufacturer $2.00 each, and you paid about $4.00 each. Now, an EAR 824 is a 2 channel preamplifier that costs $11,000 ($5,500 per channel). So they're the same, right? Sure, like a used Yugo and a new Ferrari.
That's the first thing you need to understand. Preamps cost from about $1.00 to over $5,000, and basically do the same thing. So what's the difference? Some preamps are cleaner than others, and some are more colored than others. It's not black and white. Preamps raise the weak mic level signal to line level, so it can be recorded, or go to a power amp to drive speakers. Cleaner ones don't change the signal much. They try not to add or take away anything from that signal. More colorful preamps *change* the signal by adding selective distortion. This can be obvious, as in most guitar amps, or subtle, as in some pricey boutique mic preamps. People pay for expensive preamps to make things sound *exactly* the way they sound, *or* to sound *better* than they sound. This color- we call it muddy, distorted, or hyped when we don't like it. We call it warmth or character when we do.
There is very little point in plugging a pricey preamp into a cheap one. Unless you can bypass the preamps in the equipment you are using, you may not get anything out of a good one. Secondly, all preamps create self-noise, which you can hear as "hiss", especially when the gain is turned way up. If you can see it on a meter, we call it a noise "floor". Noise is not "character", and it is *never* good. Better preamps produce more gain and less noise. Whether they are cleaner or more colorful is a matter of preference, and what you intend to use them for. The M-Audio DMP3 Massive Master mentioned is wicked cheap (compared to that EAR I mentioned), about $140. It is pretty clean, and doesn't produce a lot of noise. It also doesn't produce bad color, which manufacturers want to convince you is warmth. The FMR Audio RNP mentioned above is slightly more colorful, and is useful for lots of things. It costs more than a DMP3.
So first, figure out what you would plug a preamp into, and whether that already has preamps. If it does, does it have line inputs that bypass the cheap preamps you already have? I recommend starting with a preamp that is pretty clean. Worry about color later- much later. I prefer 2 channels to 1, as it is very useful for stereo recording to have 2 identical channels. The DMP3 has 2, which is one of the things I like about it. The sad truths about preamps are these: 1.You get what you pay for, and cheap ones generally suck. 2. Sticking a little tube in the front end and calling it a "tube based" preamp just adds to noise and distortion, and does not add pleasing color. and- 3. As in car racing, 90% of the money is spent on the last 10% of performance. The better your preamp is, the more money it will take to get a noticeable improvement. Hope that helps.-Richie
