It puts the hard in hardware

[Magpel]

Post has no real purpose other than pure expression of frustration...

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So I'm working patiently toward some significant hardware uprgrades in my wee composer's studio. The only commercial kind of work that transpires here is me writing and recording music for theater or multimedia and whatnot, as well my own song demos and my bandmate's.

 

I'm looking at a core upgrade: a really good two channel preamp, possibly some new converters, some room treatment (essentially to kill my horrible sounding room...) definitely some more good mics down the road. Real staple stuff.

 

The greatest thing about software upgrades is not only do you get to audtion everything first--but you get to slot it right into your existing projects, do A-B (and C-D-E-F) comparisons and shoot outs effortlessly and ON YOUR OWN damn material, not on some Nashville diva yelling "yeah!" into 5 different class A preamps for your consideration...

 

That's the rub. I KNOW in advance of dropping anywhere up to 2k on a dual channel pre that I will NOT have had adequate opportunity to explore and compare.

 

I could put in the legwork and exploit every opportunity I DO have to check stuff out, whether by making the rounds of the few studios I do have casual access to or by disguising demos as purchases at my local, very accomodating and outrageously well-stocked gargantuan music store (Alto Music, Middletown NY)--not my style, and the reward doesn't justify the effort. My time will be better spent by working on music and doing some online research...for guys like me who do not and do not want to move through lots of studios working on any projects but my own, shopping for recording hardware is like shopping for mattresses...you get a couple of minutes on a unit way outside the context of your bedroom and try to hold a fleeting sense impression in your body as you move to another unit, and say "check" into it.

 

Buying an acoustic guitar is a great experience. You take your time, stop trotting out your defensive music store licks and really play the way you play. Come back a week later, and again a week after that. Pretty soon you'll have a purring kitten with a undeniable affinity for you sitting in your lap and you'll be figuring out how you can raise the $1800 or whatever...

 

But recording hardware--so much reputation and buzz involved! So much defensive bickering among the experts! So much arrogance and envy and dubious authority! Yikes!

 

I'm done. Thx for listening.

[MikeRivers]

 

Buying an acoustic guitar is a great experience. You take your time, stop trotting out your defensive music store licks and really play the way you play. Come back a week later, and again a week after that. Pretty soon you'll have a purring kitten with a undeniable affinity for you sitting in your lap and you'll be figuring out how you can raise the $1800 or whatever... But recording hardware--so much reputation and buzz involved! So much defensive bickering among the experts! So much arrogance and envy and dubious authority! Yikes!

I feel your pain. But there's a difference betwen shopping for guitars and preamps. While no store has all the preamps or all the guitars in stock, a decent store will have a decent selection of brands and models to choose from. If you have your heart set on a Martin and the shop has Taylors, do you play the Taylors (yeah, probably you do) or do you go elsewhere? If you have your heart set on a Millenia and the shop has Focusrite, do you listen to the Focusrite? Yeah, probably.

 

Thing is that once you've decided that you want a particular make and model guitar, you'll probably stick with that and you'll still want to play a bunch of them in the shop to pick out the one you like best because they're all different. But do you worry that the shop in the next town who also sells that brand might have a better one than the one you picked out? No, probably not. You have to stop cutting bait and fishing sometime.

 

Preamps are more uniform. If you hear a Millenia, you know what a Millenia sounds like. But how will it sound with your mic? Or your voice, or your guitar, in your song? There are just so many variable that, like with guitars, you have to just make a choice. Once you get over a certain threshold, no matter what you buy isn't going to suck, and it will almost always be better than what you have, so you might as well learn to use it.

 

And while it might not be as much fun or attract as many chicks, it's possible to try out mic preamps in a shop. Bring your own mic if you have a decent one. Bring your own guitar if that's what you want to use it for. Or bring your voice or a friend's voice. Set up the mic with the preamp and record something. Take the recording home with you and listen to it in your own studio when you're not rushed. You can make several test recordings and get a sense of what each preamp does.

 

You can visit several stores to get to hear different brands. Don't try to A/B compare in the shop, do it at home.

[John Sayers]

and while you are at it plug your mike into a Mackie Onyx and other similar mixer setups in the same price range (sub $2K) and compare their pres to the stand alone ones. Then compare what functions each offers relative to the recording quality.