From las8323@rs175174.ks.boeing.com Thu Dec 06 16:05:48 2001
Subject:pre-amp

Can it be too smooth?

Tube preamp would help, yep, soz I figgered the ART would be a good start.
Partly cuz here in flyover country, there's nowhere to try one out and
partly cuz if it wasn't great for organ I could still use it for my Rode NT-2
as a phantom power/tuber (a phantpwr mic is a pain even on my Mackie24 cuz
you gotta power down before switching on the p/p). Hooked it up. Yup, ok.
Better ... not phantastic, but certainly nice.

Taking a nod from our emminent listmeister Bruce, I went thinking may TWO
Arts in series as he runs a dual mp just that way. So looking around, I
spot that they make a Tube EQ, a "4 band", kinda, parametric. It's really
just hi shelve, 2band, low shelve. Why? The reports of the "really good"
tubers all include ref to freq changes. So why not? Freq changes here
I come.

So first is the parametric. Wow, very nice. Not just for the 'tubesound'
but the eq really really helped. My V3 has the pronounced "Voce Snap" like
my microbe -- not as loud, but there. Good work for eq. Bass boost just
cuz. (I play with NO lower foldback; all 91 notes the way God intended.)
Fiddle with the middle -- really nice. Still not organasmic, but I'm
breathing heavier.

Then I try the 'in series' hookup. Now this must be where everyone is
using all the "creamy" descriptors. The sound just sorta 'ooozed' out.
BTW, eq first-pre second seemed the most effective smoothing.

Which brings me full circle. See, IMO, with both tubers the sound was....
well,.... it was ... just *too* smooth . So I went back to one.
Now maybe it was cuz my last pre was a cheap-ass guitar unit that was
overstated in 'tubessence' or maybe my listening environs rival a trash
can for acoustics but none of the 'growl' or 'rumble' really appealed to
me (none that *I* could get, anyway) and twist as I might, the levels/eq
never had the bite of just one. Now, tubes is good. Just dunno if I'm
alone in this but "too smooth" is what keeps coming up. Got several
distort-o-box gizmos that sound way better than anything from this combo.

Help me out here. Any tube "contrarians"? Or am I alone on this?
Anyone else got this reaction? Might be doing something wrong and
this place would be the first to check.

My back east trip has been postponed to April. Gonna stop in at SHayes
and check out the Standard to recalibrate my Reference (well, ok, I dunno
if his is any better than anyone else's but it's just *gotta* be better
than the local pawn shops :-). Will certainly know more then, but still
somewhat mystified for now.

Larry