Question: Reampers VS. Line level Transformers?

  • Thread starter Thread starter chrisghost
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chrisghost

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I'm in the market for a reamper (actually 2, because I like to have everything in pairs.)

Whyle browsing for one I found this DIY kit which is basicly an Edcor transformer + some wires and inputs.

Then... I remembered that I have a pair of Shure a95a line matching transformers laying around.

It seems to me that line matching transformers and reamp boxes are the exact same thing...

Am I right in this assumption?
 
Bump.

No one has any thoughts to share on this assumption?
 
Yes, it is the same type of thing, but the transformer might not be the right value.

It's not just a matter of changing a high impedance signal to a low impedance signal. It also needs to change the level.

Since the terms high and low are relative, you need to determine what the signal is and what it needs to be. That will determine the type of transformer needed.
 
Thanks a lot.

When picking a reamper I should make a simular consideration right? So a reamper with a pad option is always preferable, in terms of versatility?
 
I guess. You can always just turn the out of the daw down if you are feeding the amp too much signal...
 
The whole reamping thing is a little murky. It performs 3 functions.
1. Isolates the signal, to stop ground loops
2. Turns balanced high impedance signal into unbalanced higher impedance signal
3. Pads line level down to instrument level.

Unfortunately, 2 and 3 will vary widely, as will how you want the signal to hit the amp.

If you want the amp to respond exactly the same way as your guitar would, using the exact same settings, you will have to experiment with the recording levels and pads on the di and reamper.

Depending on your amp, it may not happen.

You can certainly just plug the output of your interface directly into your amp, but it might be noisy. If you are willing to tweak the amp, you will get good results more easily.
 
That's all very helpfull, thanks. Since your first response I've been reading up on attenuation, which is a real eye opener.

I've been recording demo's for years and didn't care about impendance differences etc. as I just needed to convey a sketch of a song.

I want to make a step up, see if I can record something that doesn't have to be re-recorded in another studio.
 
There was also a great article about how to build a reamping box with volume, tone and impedance knob in a Germany magazine... I built one of them years ago and it works absolutely great! Build cost was below 20 EUR and it took me less than an hour to build it...I can see if I still find the article somewhere :)
 
hmmm - I found it but since I'm a new member I can't post images yet... :/
 
The shure xformers have a relatively narrow bandwidth compared to the Edcor,due to the tiny xformers used.
 
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