your favorite preamps on a mixer/recorder?

[22tape]

hey guys. i'm in the market for a mixer and/or a multitrack recorder (preferably tape; but i can also do digital recorder). i have a modest setup. my main concern is the quality of the onboard preamps. i used to have a tascam 246. i really loved the way those pre's sounded. they could get VERY dirty if needed. i miss that.

anyway, what's your favorite?

thanks!

 

[pohaku]

For a mixer, at least one that isn't stratospheric in price, a Midas. Really great preamps. Otherwise, for less money, the usual suspects - Mackie and A&H.

If I was looking at a non-computer based multitrack recorder, I'd look at some combination of an Alesis HD24xr and a mixer or set of preamps (True Precision 8, couple of Syteks, Mackie, etc.).

How many inputs do you need and how much money do you have to spend? We can probably make more appropriate suggestions if we knew that.

 

[ssscientist]

i really loved the way those pre's sounded. they could get VERY dirty if needed. i miss that.

anyway, what's your favorite?

thanks!

I miss those days too, but there are SO many freeware and low-$ plugins that will distort your audio and do it in a controlled, repeatable way that I have gone the hi-tech route and use my Presonus Firebox preamps with TriDirt, Camel Crusher, TDA DT424, TubeBooster, TLs SaturatedDriver and Chorrosive --- and those are just the free ones.

Any one of these can be dialed back to produce SOME dirt but not so much that it sounds fuzzy or distorted.

I love my controlled dirt because it fills in the gaps in songs that otherwise would be missing that 'certain something'.



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