mic pre's

larryo wrote on 3/18/2004, 4:19 AM

Hi all, I am looking to upgrade the front end of my home recording studio. Just wondering if any of you have had any experience with the Focusrite Voicemaster Pro. I have good mics, run them through a cheap mixer into my Delta 44. My budget would be somewhere in the VMP range. Thanks for any advice.

Comments

CDM wrote on 3/18/2004, 5:48 AM

Funny you should ask. I'm using it right now, and for a lower-end mic pre, I think it sounds great. I've been researching a LOT of mic pre's in the past months as I'm expanding my voice-over studio and need to get some higher end stuff for my A room. However, after trying a lot of pre's I found this to have great head-room when you push it, and that's what I was looking for. I don't really use any of the bells and whistles (except for the compressor section, but more as a limiter). In the same price range - and a lot simpler a device, meaning you're probably paying for better mic pre's and not the whistles - is the Summit Audio 2BA-221. What I like about this pre is the sweepable bass rolloff and the sweepable impedance. Other than that, it's just got a phase inverse and about 55dB of gain.

Obviously, there's a lot of choice out there, but of what I've heard, that's what I'd recommend in the $500 range

stakeoutstudios wrote on 3/18/2004, 6:33 AM

When you get some good pres, just make sure you also have a patchbay to split the balanced mic-pre out:

1 signal straight to the A/D
1 signal to your mixer for monitoring purposes.

If you run the pres through the mixer you'll lose any quality you might have gained!

I recommend Signex patchbays (they're balanced, modules that you can flip) beware of cheaper patchbays as they may be un-balanced.

Jason