Use of pre-amp

  • Thread starter Thread starter tvolhein
  • Start date Start date
tvolhein said:
Is taking a pre-recorded track back through an outboard pre-amp, exactly the same as it would have been to track through the outboard pre-amp to begin with.

thanks,

tom

Tom Volhein
tvolhein@gmail.com
http://www.tomvolhein.com
Click to expand...

Not really. To have recorded it in the first place, the signal had to be amplified; now you'd be doing so again. So to my way of thinking, if your initial track were through an exceptionally clean and quiet pre, you may get some benefit if the subsequent pre has color to add. In any case, you'd be working with the combination of the two, and would need to be cautious w/your gain.

Off the topic: I'm a link follower, and followed yours. I love your site and have bookmarked it. If you don't mind, I'll stop in now and again and follow you on your path...

Welcome!
 
tvolhein said:
Is taking a pre-recorded track back through an outboard pre-amp, exactly the same as it would have been to track through the outboard pre-amp to begin with.
thanks,
tom

Tom Volhein
tvolhein@gmail.com
http://www.tomvolhein.com
Click to expand...

I think Whitestrat got the answer right on this one.

I took a walk over to your site as well. The first thing I noticed was that you have a bunch of my favorite singer/songwriters on your musician's list... Shindell, Gorka, Brown... that's a great list.

I gave a listen to your songs. I think you have a bit of a Steve Goodman thing going on and there ain't nothing bad anyone can say about that. That's some high praise.

I have a friend who lives out your way, also a songwriter. His name is Steve Speisman. He plays gigs occasionally and I know he's done the Prescott Folk Festival a few times. He's gotten a little exposure because he worked on the planning of the AZ 9/11 memorial that has come under a bit of flack from some local politician (Steve lost his brother who was on the plane that hit the Pentagon). If you ever cross paths with him, he's a good guy to say hello to.

Jim
www.jimcaputo.com
 
Thanks for the visit

WhiteStrat said:
Not really. To have recorded it in the first place, the signal had to be amplified; now you'd be doing so again. So to my way of thinking, if your initial track were through an exceptionally clean and quiet pre, you may get some benefit if the subsequent pre has color to add. In any case, you'd be working with the combination of the two, and would need to be cautious w/your gain.

Off the topic: I'm a link follower, and followed yours. I love your site and have bookmarked it. If you don't mind, I'll stop in now and again and follow you on your path...

Welcome!
Click to expand...

Thanks for visiting my site. I should be putting some new music up in a month or so. Now I am neck deep in upgrading my studio.

As far as my question goes, coloring is exactly what I want to do with the recorded signal. I am going to test this with a tube pre.

t
 
Thanks for the visit

JTC111 said:
I think Whitestrat got the answer right on this one.

I took a walk over to your site as well. The first thing I noticed was that you have a bunch of my favorite singer/songwriters on your musician's list... Shindell, Gorka, Brown... that's a great list.

I gave a listen to your songs. I think you have a bit of a Steve Goodman thing going on and there ain't nothing bad anyone can say about that. That's some high praise.

I have a friend who lives out your way, also a songwriter. His name is Steve Speisman. He plays gigs occasionally and I know he's done the Prescott Folk Festival a few times. He's gotten a little exposure because he worked on the planning of the AZ 9/11 memorial that has come under a bit of flack from some local politician (Steve lost his brother who was on the plane that hit the Pentagon). If you ever cross paths with him, he's a good guy to say hello to.

Jim
www.jimcaputo.com
Click to expand...

Thanks for the visit, Jim. :):) I will keep an eye/ear out for Steve.

t
 
(A) As mentioned, it's most definitely not the same. Like trying to take a photo that's out of focus and shooting it with another camera -- It doesn't react the way you might want it to.

(B) If you're looking for "color," you probably shouldn't be looking at tubes... Unless they're exceptionally nice tube preamps (as opposed to $500 "toob" preamps). Even then, it's generally not the tubes - It's the transformers. A nice, colorful (99% of the time, solid-state) EQ or dynamics unit (think Great River or API) is going to get you a lot closer than running a direct-level signal through a mic pre.
 
Hi Tom,

I use a pair of Fearn VT-4 tube EQs quite often without even engaging the the EQ sections which then essentially acts like a tube pre. It adds a certain "depth" and warmth that I find to be desirable in many cases.

To compare tracking with adding later consider the chain:

If you track with a tube pre the signal will be more "pure" since the signal is mic->tube pre->A/D converter->DAW.

Redoing later it's mic->some other pre->A/D converter->DAW->D/A converter->tube pre->A/D->DAW again.

That said, if the original pre used in the equation above is pretty clean, it's going to get you closer than anything else.
 
masteringhouse said:
Hi Tom,

I use a pair of Fearn VT-4 tube EQs quite often without even engaging the the EQ sections which then essentially acts like a tube pre. It adds a certain "depth" and warmth that I find to be desirable in many cases.

To compare tracking with adding later consider the chain:

If you track with a tube pre the signal will be more "pure" since the signal is mic->tube pre->A/D converter->DAW.

Redoing later it's mic->some other pre->A/D converter->DAW->D/A converter->tube pre->A/D->DAW again.

That said, if the original pre used in the equation above is pretty clean, it's going to get you closer than anything else.
Click to expand...

masteringhouse

What do you think of an Avalon 737? That is the pre that I have my eye on. I can't afford anything like a Fearn VT-4.

FYI
My original take uses no pre, just direct into a Fireface 800. The reason I want to test looping back through a pre with some color, compression and eq is to experiment with sculpting the sound as I have the time, so that I am not re-tracking live over and over.

t
 
tvolhein said:
What do you think of an Avalon 737? That is the pre that I have my eye on.
Click to expand...

The 737 is a pretty clean pre, not much color. A site called "The Listening Sessions" did a comparison of a whole bunch of mic pres and made a chart that you might find useful.

Mic Pre Chart
 
tvolhein said:
masteringhouse

What do you think of an Avalon 737? That is the pre that I have my eye on. I can't afford anything like a Fearn VT-4.

FYI
My original take uses no pre, just direct into a Fireface 800. The reason I want to test looping back through a pre with some color, compression and eq is to experiment with sculpting the sound as I have the time, so that I am not re-tracking live over and over.

t
Click to expand...

I haven't tried this unit, but Avalon has a good reputation and other units I've heard sound great. According to the info below the feedback is generally good. The only general complaint seems to be that the comp does react quickly enough:

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/high-end/812-avalon-737-a.html

Quite a few seem to say that it a generally transparent sounding tube pre. Personally I don't find fault with that. Transparency is usually the sign of a good design.

I'm usually wary of all-in-one units as there are compromises that need to be made in order to get it into a single box, but from the feedback it seems that they have made a good balance of the functions.

Another similar unit is the Drawmer 1960 see:
http://www.drawmer.com/products/sixties-series/1960-mic-pre-vacuum-tube-compressor.php or

http://www.mercenary.com/19vactubcomm.html

I have tried the non-Mercenary edition of this back about 10 years ago and thought that it was a very good unit. It was recommended to a friend of mine by Rob Fraboni when he was working with Keith Richards, see:
http://transaudiodirect.stores.yahoo.net/prrobfrreond.html

Fearn also makes a single mic pre called the VT-1 which is in the same price range as the Avalon 737 and Drawmer. Doug Fearn is very much into quality with no compromise (which is why his stuff is on the more expensive side). I would imagine the pre is better than the Avalon and Drawmer, but if you are currently just running directly to the Fireface the additional functionality of the Avalon or Drawmer would be very useful.

As with any peice of gear, see if you can demo or rent to determine if it fits your needs before buying.
 
Last edited:
masteringhouse,

This is great info. I am still thinking about the Avalon, but the Fearn stuff looks great and the Drawmer is a dual. I can't get gearslutz.com to respond yet, but I want to look at that review too.

thanks so much

t

Tom Volhein
tvolhein@gmail.com
http://www.tomvolhein.com
 
JTC111 said:
The 737 is a pretty clean pre, not much color. A site called "The Listening Sessions" did a comparison of a whole bunch of mic pres and made a chart that you might find useful.

Mic Pre Chart
Click to expand...

Thanks JTC111,

The chart is excellent. For my first pre, I think that a clear/clean sound would be nice and the 737 rates good there.

Also, I clicked through to the mic chart on the same site. It is interesting too, a little dated but helpful.

Thanks

t

Tom Volhein
tvolhein@gmail.com
http://www.tomvolhein.com
 
I took a look at the mic pre chart linked to above. Having used most of those preamps on those list on multiple occasions, I see things quite a bit differently then how that list shows things. Personally, the Avalon 737 at least is not a preamp I would consider to be clean. To place it right next to a Grace 101 in the list seems absolutely nuts to. Those two preamps have about as different a sound as you can imagine. So which is the clean pre? Well, the grace is very widely accepted as being pretty clean. My D&R console is also generally viewed like that, and sounds nothing like the Avalon. I have my own personal disliking of the Avalon 737 for various reasons, but that does not mean that it might not be the right unit for the poster here though.

A couple things I would consider here.... First, the initial preamp used here will make a much larger difference. The depth, response and dimension that a good preamp captures can not truly be reclaimed by another later. Especially after a couple stages of conversion. That being said, that also does not mean that you won't be happier with tracks recorded on a Mackie after they have been run through some good iron. Scientifically speaking, the tracks through just the Mackie are goin to be more "pure" or "undistorted" than those that have been subsequently pushed through another preamp later. However, in my opinion that doesn't mean anything. This is music, and science rarely wins out here. Its all about the sound you want.

Another thing to consider is how a preamp works. Once you send your original tracks back out of your DAW, you are sending them out at line level and will most likely want to use the line input on your outboard unit as using the mic preamp will severely overload many units unless their inputs are set up to handle this kind of load. The biggest problem with this is that a units is character is often much stronger when using the mic preamp rather than the line amp. Once again though, that is a technical thing, and not necessarily indicitive of what you need or might get, but this technical item may win this battle.

In looking at this, a channel strip still seems like a good option because it could also be used down the road as the primary source and most of this becomes a moot point. Then again, there may be other options. For just trying to breathe some new life into old tracks, a good hardware EQ and comp seem to be where I would be looking. The DW Fearn stuff mentioned above is definately excellent stuff. It is pricey, but well built and designed. Another good option might be some of the Pendulum offerings. With the really well built stuff, you can often achieve a nice shift in tone just passing through it and receive the benefit of its iron, or just slightly process with it and capture some of its unique presence. There are many articles that talk about engineers that used to pass signals though older 1176's and LA4's in bypass just to get a bit of "that" sound. Some people still like analog tape for this too. You may want to have a look at some of the stuff from Cranesong and form Emperical labs as well. Maybe an EL Fatso is what you need here, but once again, something with a preamp in it will help to solve this problem for future tracks as well:)
 
Thanks xstatic,

For me this issue has become simply what pre amp I want to get as my first. I am going to include Pendulum in my research. So, thanks for that. I am looking into the Pendulum MDP 1. It looks good. Do you have any further opinions about that one?

t
 
xstatic said:
I took a look at the mic pre chart linked to above. Having used most of those preamps on those list on multiple occasions, I see things quite a bit differently then how that list shows things.
Click to expand...

Get 10 audio engineers in a room together and ask them to rank 10 pres from most color to least and you're likely to get 10 different lists. But for someone who's coming at this without too much ears-on experience with the pres on the list, I think it's helpful ...not perfect, not even close to that ...helpful.

So just to be clear, I'm not disagreeing. I put that out there because I thought it would be helpful. The OP can also go to that site and hear many of those pres in a shootout they did some time ago. I forgot to mention that when I gave the link to the chart. Hearing the boxes is certainly better than reading about them.

And now I'm going kayaking.... later!
 
For my first pre, I think that a clear/clean sound would be nice and the 737 rates good there.
Click to expand...
I would (very, very highly) recommend *not* getting a piece of tube gear as a "first preamp" -- Too much maintenance. You could very easily go with Amek, Neve, Langevin, API, etc., etc., etc.

Heck, throw down just a whisker more and you can get a Crane Song Flamingo -- Perhaps the greatest preamp ever designed (IMO/E). Transparent as anything when you want it - Thick and gooey when you don't - and 9 (9?) color options. And dual channels. And the greatest metering I've ever seen on a preamp. And it's freakin' Crane Song (if that wasn't enough all by itself).

And no tubes to get all frotzy (and excessively hot - and expensive to replace and service, etc., etc., etc.).
 
There are certainly some very good solid state preamps, Neve is one of my favorites for an organic warmer solid state sound, API for clean, and the list goes on. If you're truly going for a "tube" sound however, go with a good tube pre.

Here is an old article written by Russ Hamm on tubes versus transistors explaining part of the difference:
http://www.milbert.com/Files/articles/TvsT/tstxt.pdf

There are characteristics of tubes that just aren't well simulated elsewhere (ask any guitar player). Yeah they may require replacement tubes every couple of years and a re-bias, but the benefits of their sound outweigh this when you are using them. A good tube unit also tends to hold it's value much more than SS devices.

Again before purchasing any unit, know what sound you are looking for, try a few units, and then decide. I have a room full of old crap that was inexpensive at the time and had all kinds of "cool" features. Looking back at those purchases I should have saved my money and waited until I could afford what I eventually decided on. If you have to get a job done before you can afford the real deal, rent. Look at it as an education in learning the sound of gear that you may want later, also the end result in your product will be that much better in using it over a compromise.

BTW, there isn't a single unit in that pile of crap that is tube other than a broken Ampeg head from the 60's that I have yet to repair. :)
 
As far as the pendulum goes, I would give serious consideration to a quartet channel strip. The preamp in it sounds great, the EQ, is beautiful, and the compressor works very well. The build on them is excellent as well. The Crane Song stuff is also a great option. If it were me, I would happily spend the extra $500 or so on a Pendulum Quartet than the Avalon 737. The pendulum can hold its own amongst some of the best stuff out there. As will the Cranesong. The new Neve channel strip that is actually an AMS Neve has been getting some surprisingly great reviews, but I have not personally used that one yet.

Like JTC mentioned aboved, we do all have different takes on the same things. It still baffles me that the Avalon was placed right next to a Grace on that list though. I can't think of two preamps that sound much different. The Grace seems to be placed in about the right place on that list to me, but the Avalon seems to be placed about 15 or 20 places too low on that list in my opinion. Odd placement for the Focusrite stuff as well. Almost like some of that list was compiled from manufacturer descriptions instead of actual use. If you really do want a cleaner more transparent pre, I would have a look at just about any of the other Avalon preamps. Personally, they sound much larger, cleaner, and more dimensional to me than the 737, but once again, the 737 does really hit a nice niche once you have a selection of other good choices.
 
xstatic said:
Like JTC mentioned aboved, we do all have different takes on the same things. It still baffles me that the Avalon was placed right next to a Grace on that list though. I can't think of two preamps that sound much different. The Grace seems to be placed in about the right place on that list to me, but the Avalon seems to be placed about 15 or 20 places too low on that list in my opinion. Odd placement for the Focusrite stuff as well. Almost like some of that list was compiled from manufacturer descriptions instead of actual use. If you really do want a cleaner more transparent pre, I would have a look at just about any of the other Avalon preamps. Personally, they sound much larger, cleaner, and more dimensional to me than the 737, but once again, the 737 does really hit a nice niche once you have a selection of other good choices.
Click to expand...

I don't know the 737, having never used one, but I did own an M5 and that's a pretty clean pre. I didn't really care for it though and traded it for a Blue Kiwi. :)
 
masteringhouse said:
Hi Tom,

I use a pair of Fearn VT-4 tube EQs quite often without even engaging the the EQ sections which then essentially acts like a tube pre. It adds a certain "depth" and warmth that I find to be desirable in many cases.

To compare tracking with adding later consider the chain:

If you track with a tube pre the signal will be more "pure" since the signal is mic->tube pre->A/D converter->DAW.

Redoing later it's mic->some other pre->A/D converter->DAW->D/A converter->tube pre->A/D->DAW again.

That said, if the original pre used in the equation above is pretty clean, it's going to get you closer than anything else.
Click to expand...



So if I understood correctly, you are using the pair of VT-4 on a stereo mix? If so, would those be a matched pair, or serial numbers in succession off the assembly line? In respect to maintaining the best stereo image possible?

Or is that not an issue?
 
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