• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

OPTIMOD 8400

A

Adam Rivers

Hello guys....

Does anyone out there have a custom build for this processor? Or suggestions? The presets just don't do it for us anymore, and we know we can get a lot more out of this processor....just nobody (engineering, programming, or otherwise) has any idea where to really start.

Thanks in advance for any help you can provide.
 
TomT said:
The folks at Omnia can be helpful on tweaking the presets. Give them a call.
Click to expand...
Think they'd help with a preset for an Orban 8400? ???
 
What's your format? What are you aiming to sound like? Open? Loud? Crunched? Hyped bass?

The 8400 always sounded slammed to me, the music never breathed until you turned it down. Then the dial presence went away.

Have an 8300 on a mostly talk station. It does well for that.
 
TomT said:
The folks at Omnia can be helpful on tweaking the presets. Give them a call.
Click to expand...

Made me laugh! I am a huge fan of 8100XT but the 8400....hmm
When you finally got it set up to sound the way you want it was grungy and distorted. Then when you tried to clean it up and pull back it got real thin and wimpy. I hear the same thing with 8500 and 8600. Seem like when you push them they don't like it. Probably just have not had someone show me or heard one that is set up properly.
 
Smiths and Smittys said:
TomT said:
The folks at Omnia can be helpful on tweaking the presets. Give them a call.
Click to expand...

Made me laugh! I am a huge fan of 8100XT but the 8400....hmm
When you finally got it set up to sound the way you want it was grungy and distorted. Then when you tried to clean it up and pull back it got real thin and wimpy. I hear the same thing with 8500 and 8600. Seem like when you push them they don't like it. Probably just have not had someone show me or heard one that is set up properly.
Click to expand...

True. My 8300 sounds great and it is handling a ton of highly compressed/crappy sounding source material that was clipped to hell during the mastering process.
 
WNTIRadio said:
What's your format? What are you aiming to sound like? Open? Loud? Crunched? Hyped bass?

The 8400 always sounded slammed to me, the music never breathed until you turned it down. Then the dial presence went away.

Have an 8300 on a mostly talk station. It does well for that.
Click to expand...

We are CHR w/ a significant 25-54 heritage audience - trying to sound cleaner (I know all Optimods have a reputation of being "dirty" boxes...but I have heard SOME clean) and have more punch to our bass. Our mids and high end are pretty good. What you are saying makes sense - every time we turn any settings up, it really seems to overcompress at the top and get real dirty. We have pretty bad dial presence because of the fact that we have turned so much down to avoid that. Our primary competitors (while all technically out of market) are running Omnias with the exception of 1 - and I'm not sure what they run - and are much louder/cleaner than we are. Basically just looking for a good, clean range where everything flows well and more punch to our bass.

We are also getting an automation upgrade w/ new sound cards in a couple weeks...maybe that will help things?
 
What's your STL system look like? Is the 8400 at the transmitter site or at the studio?

I've seen cases where the processor was moved to the transmitter site and the AES inputs on (especially Harris DigitCD) the exciter were bypassed in favor of the composite input, and that has improved the sound dramatically.

The 8400 can only be pushed so far, then it just goes into crunch mode. Try slowing down the release times on the 5 band comp/limiter by a bit and turning up the clipping, gradually slowing/turning up as you go along. Sometimes that can give some breathing room without losing loudness.

I forget, does the 8400 only have the slow/m-slow/m-fast/fast settings or are there offsets for each band? It's been awhile since I've messed with one, and the 84-8600 all blur together in my mind on the interface. If you can slow the attack time down on the bass band, that may give you more punch. Try raising the threshold on the bass clipper to where the bass just starts to push into the main clipper and then back it off by .5dB.
 
One additional suggestion, if you indeed have a Harris Digit exciter with an AES interface under no circumstances consider using the emergency composite
input on that module, you will be jumping from one frying pan into another. Try to get an analog module with a real composite input though they may be hard to find with everyone realizing how bad the AES module sucks and replacing it. The only AES signal that sounds reasonably correct using it is when it is mated with an Orban Optimod 8200. Harris designed that module when the 8200 appeared on the scene, If Bob Orban is around he will shed some light on what the Harris AES module problem is all about. Frank Foti has also weighed in on this topic.
 
WNTIRadio said:
What's your STL system look like? Is the 8400 at the transmitter site or at the studio?

I've seen cases where the processor was moved to the transmitter site and the AES inputs on (especially Harris DigitCD) the exciter were bypassed in favor of the composite input, and that has improved the sound dramatically.

The 8400 can only be pushed so far, then it just goes into crunch mode. Try slowing down the release times on the 5 band comp/limiter by a bit and turning up the clipping, gradually slowing/turning up as you go along. Sometimes that can give some breathing room without losing loudness.

I forget, does the 8400 only have the slow/m-slow/m-fast/fast settings or are there offsets for each band? It's been awhile since I've messed with one, and the 84-8600 all blur together in my mind on the interface. If you can slow the attack time down on the bass band, that may give you more punch. Try raising the threshold on the bass clipper to where the bass just starts to push into the main clipper and then back it off by .5dB.
Click to expand...

It is at the studio - and I doubt we'd be allowed to move it to the TX site. We have a recently repaired STL which our engineer assures us is completely transparent. 8400 has offsets for each band.....we'll definitely try to do those things next time we take a look at it. It's back on the back burner again (unfortunately) - but thank you for the good advice, definitely the first thing I will try.

I searched on this board and found 8400 Hot AC presets from years ago...maybe we'll give those a shot, too.
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom