How much difference does the preamp make?

[AndyCarpenter]

Another newbie question for you guys...right now I am running my SM57 into the preamp built into my SBlive platinum 5.1 card—which seems like a pretty half-assed way of doing things. I am thinking I need to get a dedicated preamp for my mic, but I have a few questions about it. How much difference does a preamp make? Is a preamp just a preamp or are there specific differences in quality. If so...what are the differences (signal to noise ratio, clipping, etc?) What is a good preamp to get? Help me out. =]

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

I just ppicking up a copy of Lynn Fuston's "3d Mic Pre CD" series... he's done comparisons of 50 or so pres -- hearing each ones characteristics is plainly obvious....

http://www.3daudioinc.com

Bruce

 

[Randy Yell]

What,no Audio Buddy?

 

[knownuttin]

Andy, please take no offense at what I say because I mean none. Nor do I mean to suggest you pull out your wallet and start shopping your way into upgrade hell. It's just that any consumer or gamer computer sound card is going to have its limitations revealed as vastly overmatched by almost any decent preamp. Think hard first whether you want to go as far into debt as we, uh...audio types.
-kent

 

[darrin_h2000]

A $150 MAudio audiophile wont break you and is wonderful if you are only interested in going 2 tracks at once.

 

[Robert D]

And you can pick up something like an ART Tube MP for another $80 or so, to put inbetween the mic and the Audiophile card. This will sound vastly superior to what you're doing now.
Cheers, RD

 

[notCardio]

What do you want to do with it? What are you trying to record? Are you just wanting to sing over some pre-recorded music, or are you trying to capture your garage band live, or something in-between? And how much are you willing to spend at the moment? (seeing as how you're starting down a lifelong path of upgrading, I reccomend starting off slowly)

 

[AndyCarpenter]

As of now I am recording acoustic guitar and vocals. I haven't been able to get a decent vocal recording at all but that's probably just because all I have is an SM57 (I'm shopping for a vocal mic right now). But I also wanna know how much difference it is going to make in the overall quality if I buy a good preamp. I would probably spend about $200 on a preamp if I were to get one.

 

[crawdad]

Blue Bear

What did you discover? What pres strike you as the creme de la creme?

 

[JohnyC]

AndyCarpenter.. look into the M-Audio Omni studio..
Its a great sound card + breakout box combo
The breakout has 2 preamps of more than decent quality
Shop around, I got mine used for $275 about 6 months ago

 

[Randy Yell]

If you decide on a seperate preamp check out the M-Audio Audio Audio Buddy.Solid state,two channels,VERY quiet and its sells for $80.Much quieter tham the Art Toob MP.If you decide to spend more check out the M-Audio DMP3 which is $200.

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Re: Blue Bear

What did you discover? What pres strike you as the creme de la creme?

For those that aren't familiar - they set the comparisons up so that you listen blind (you don't know what pre is being used) and you listen to the same performance done thru each different pre....) (I won't go into details - they spell it all out at the site... sufffice it to say that it is a good comparison to judge characteristics on each of tracks)

I only had time to do the female vocal comparisons. But several immediately jumped out at me as being superior-sounding -- (and I was very surprised by one of them when I saw which pre it was!) The top 4 I preferred (for the female vocal tracks) was the ORAM MWS, AVALON 737, LANGEVIN DUAL COMBO, and the MACKIE 1604 VLZ. The AVALON was my overall favourite. I was surprised by some of my notes as I found out which pre was which - there were some high-end pres which didn't grab me at all! Presumably - they weren't best-suited for the particular mic and/or context.

Next up is the acoustic guitar tracks and I'm curious to see if I'll pick the same pres for it... then there's male vocals, and snare tracks.

There's also a mic comparison test along similar lines..........

It is an enlightening listening test and I highly recommend it............

Bruce

 

[knownuttin]

Welcome Andy, to the road to upgrade hell. Don't say you were not warned. Every purchase contains the seed of the next gear lust, and there is no end. You can only hope to contain.

The better mic for your vocals (and the 57's no great shakes on acoustics either) will reveal the shortcomings of recording into your Soundblaster's 1/8" input. If you buy a condensor mic (which most do for vox & acoustics) you will need phantom power (unless it takes batteries) and at that stage you might as well get a decent pre or a mini-mixer.

Buy too cheaply and outgrow the quality or limitations too quickly. You might say "Oh, I only need two inputs" now, but next year when you start getting good at it, you want to do band demos (your own?) and you need a minimum of eight.

Like I said, it never ends.
-kent

 

[JuSumPilgrim]

A good pre will not turn your shitty recordings into gold. What you need to understand is that each piece of gear you own contributes something to your overall sound. You need to figure out exactly what that is and whether its good or bad.
When you upgrade, you change your sound for the better (usually) bit by bit. Along with your mixing skills. Rarely is there one thing that you could point to that had a profound effect on things.

 

[Simmons]

Hey Blue Bear!

Did you ever get a chance to compare pres for acoustic guitar and male vocals as you mentioned above? Which ones did you like?

Just curious....

Simmons

 

[DJL]

How much difference does a preamp make?

There is a BIG difference between your soundcard preamp and a good outboard preamp... like a street car vs a race car. But it also takes a good monitoring system and room to really hear all the differences.

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

Re: Hey Blue Bear!

Did you ever get a chance to compare pres for acoustic guitar and male vocals as you mentioned above? Which ones did you like?

Just curious....

Simmons

Never had a chance... I still recommend picking up Lynn's Mic Pre comparison CDs though...!

I also suggest you check out the Great River MP2-NV --- will do very well on vocals and acoustic guitar. There is also a single channel version (MP1-NV)....