Re: [LAU] Preamp for mic/ guitar

Thursday, 29 May 2008 alle 22:50:09, schoappied ha scritto: They're "industry standards" :) A mixer would do better only if it's a big and old one: I grabbed recently a soundtracs rx-8 for 400 eur and it is fantastic sounding and very flexible (even if a bit heavy). Brands to search for are all british (in my opinion): sountracs, allen & heath, souncraft, studiomaster, trident. At the top of the food chain there are studers, but I fear that will cost at least around 1500 eur. I have also a rack mountable soundcraft folio but its preamps, althoug better than the ones of ART or behringer, are not up to the ones on the 24 channel soundtracs console. A 24 channel console can be overkill for your puroposes, but can be the best thing to search for in the used market. Buy locally if you can, as you'd better try all channels and functions (and noises) before buiyng. I had one of those, and sell it immediatly. Not very good, in my opinion too I don't know it I have two of these and they're fine for the price. I never use the "valve" feature, though.. maybe those are among the best in this price range. I also have a dbx 285a (around 280 eur) which is a channel strip with some useful features like a compressor, an expander and deesser. Nice. I often use this one for single mic recordings. Then on the "little more expensive side", I have a Groove tubes "the brick" (around 400 eur) which is a true tube preamp, great as bass DI but doesn't have lots of gain. Then, and this is my best and most used one, there is the FMR really nice preamp (2 channels for ~ 500 eur). If you can afford it is a really good sounding preamp, and one of the most recognized even by pro users (even if "entry level", by their standards)