Gidge said:
like i said, "with certain mics" the input seems to be clipped easily......with most mics theres an ample amount of headroom......
also, when somebody asks a question, theres very few times ill consider it "pretty damn imaterial and inconsequential".....
The
question isn't necessarily inconsequential, but the difference between the two mic pres -- in most cases -- will be.
The Mackie has a lot more headroom. Tons more. But the sound kinda' thins out a bit the higher you have to crank the gain -- hence it's reputation for sounding thin at times. But for most personal-studio type projects, they're both very good inexpensive mic pres when used within their respective limits.
The dmp2 doesn't crank out the necessary phantom power for a lot of the more power-needy condensers. A lot of them will be just fine with it, though, particularly electrets and some smaller diaphragms. But it is something to beware of. Not to mention the input handling is pretty meager, so you shouldn't be using it on very loud sources or with hotter mics unless you've got an attenuator pad. . . . Which, by the way, might create even more problems since most attenuator pads will cut down even more on the amount of phantom juice getting to the mic.
Both the headroom and phantom power issues were addressed with the dmp3. Other than that, it has basically the same burr-brown opamp . . . with the dmp2 having the ina103 -- basically an earlier, discontinued version of the 163, but for audio purposes, they're mostly identical.
Even for a very picky person, these mic pres are fine. They're just flimsily-built and Quality Control isn't nearly as good as with most other M-Audio gear, so you have to keep your expectations in line.
This is about the 3rd or 4th time Shackrock has asked this question in the last couple years. I'm not sure what new and earthshattering info he's expecting to glean this time around. I've basically ansered it the same because the answer still hasn't really changed.
