I have a 286A in the junk pile of the office studio I just cleaned out. It died about five years ago. I remember it sounding quite good when we used it for cutting spots in the days before 'software processing'.
-
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
Voice Processing (Aphex 230, DBX 286, Symetrix 528e, Air Corp PH 500)
I'm going to be the odd ball in this discussion. I've worked at a multiple station facility where there was no voice processing in all studios. So when a spot was cut or voice tracking was done, every room sounded the same. Sure enough over time the prod director bought a Symetrix 528 for himself. Suddenly there was a line of voice trackers wanting to used only his room at all times of the day. Then the morning guy on one of the FMs wants his own mic and processor. That room is suddenly used as a voice track booth. I was kind of bummed when we couldn't get all the rooms to sound alike and we had 8 of them with 3 mics in each.
Moving on in life, I got to build a brand new AM facility and corporate purchased 4 RE27s and 4 Symetrix 528Es. I was never impressed with the sound, but understood that I really needed gates to cut down on room echo/phasing when natural voices are louder than others.
Just 2 years ago I build another AM Talk Studio and got to buy 5 RE27s for the main room and had a spare RE20 for the traffic reporter booth. All mics now have Aphex 230s. For Aphex I would say this is the most processed sounding product they ever have developed and to some might not be their flavor. I have many things Marv has brought to market at Aphex and I like these boxes for the amount of guests we put on the air live. Yes, the gate needs to be adjusted to be a bit more gentler, but I prefer its sound over the swishing sounds 528Es used to make.
Jeff
Moving on in life, I got to build a brand new AM facility and corporate purchased 4 RE27s and 4 Symetrix 528Es. I was never impressed with the sound, but understood that I really needed gates to cut down on room echo/phasing when natural voices are louder than others.
Just 2 years ago I build another AM Talk Studio and got to buy 5 RE27s for the main room and had a spare RE20 for the traffic reporter booth. All mics now have Aphex 230s. For Aphex I would say this is the most processed sounding product they ever have developed and to some might not be their flavor. I have many things Marv has brought to market at Aphex and I like these boxes for the amount of guests we put on the air live. Yes, the gate needs to be adjusted to be a bit more gentler, but I prefer its sound over the swishing sounds 528Es used to make.
Jeff
I say the best gate is - no gate! 
Like some others, I had luck working at the radio station that had all studios (and all control rooms) appropriately deadened with acoustic treatment, so we never needed to use gate in voice processing.
On the other station I had studios treated and I can tell you there's a massive difference in how the station's talents and guests sounded on-air before and after. No mic, gate or voice processing can fix a bad room acoustics. And putting up absorbers on the walls really doesn't cost that much.
Regards,
Goran Tomas
Like some others, I had luck working at the radio station that had all studios (and all control rooms) appropriately deadened with acoustic treatment, so we never needed to use gate in voice processing.
On the other station I had studios treated and I can tell you there's a massive difference in how the station's talents and guests sounded on-air before and after. No mic, gate or voice processing can fix a bad room acoustics. And putting up absorbers on the walls really doesn't cost that much.
Regards,
Goran Tomas
AMEN! The question about gates is "how close to natural can we force this thing to sound?". I've yet to hear a gated mic without anything else on air at the same time that has a sound I'd call natural. Using a gate is like the doctor who prefers to fill you with pills to mask the symptoms rather than cure the underlying problem.Goran Tomas said:I say the best gate is - no gate!
F
fugazi
Guest
About the gate, no gate is best. Agreed.
But still, the 286 sounds very good. It's a very good box for the money.
I tried the cheaper Behring VX2000 as well and found out it has a much better gate. Compression wise the 286 is way better and sounds more natural.
a 528E is too much overprised, unfortunately.
BR
Evert
But still, the 286 sounds very good. It's a very good box for the money.
I tried the cheaper Behring VX2000 as well and found out it has a much better gate. Compression wise the 286 is way better and sounds more natural.
a 528E is too much overprised, unfortunately.
BR
Evert
Goran Tomas said:I say the best gate is - no gate!
Typically with audio processing, if subtle side-effects are desired then extreme modifications to the signal should be avoided.
Gating is bad only because its effect is clearly audible. A more elegant solution to the problem of low-level noise is downward expansion, gating's college-educated brother.
.Just a few dB of downward expansion at an optimized time constant and ratio will yield useful results whose effects are completely inaudible. Completely turning off the audio (gating) is overkill when just a slight reduction can make the problem noise no longer obvious.
Kind Regards,
David
I agree with David. The DBX286A, for example, works great with very light use of the expander.
Threshold and ratio set in the 9-10 o'clock range. You won't hear it working at all, but your noise floor will drop 5-10 db. Also, I recommend using the high pass filter.
I think the DBX expander is superior to the Symentrix.
Threshold and ratio set in the 9-10 o'clock range. You won't hear it working at all, but your noise floor will drop 5-10 db. Also, I recommend using the high pass filter.
I think the DBX expander is superior to the Symentrix.
With the number of times I've walked away from a gate disappointed, I plead guilty to not even giving the 286A's expander a fair shot. At the 10 o'clock range on both Threshold & Ratio, it does drop the noise floor by a considerable amount & still remains natural sounding. Thanks for pointing this out surfdude.surfdude said:
J
JAlan84
Guest
I've narrowed it down to the Aphex 230 or the Avalon 737. They both are both similar in price used. Has anyone tried both? Like and dislikes?
It is interesting to me how so many of these subjective observations agree with what I remember hearing. Like everyone else, a long time ago I noticed and appreciated the great compression sound of the DBX 286.
Re: Gating
I agree with David, that downward expansion (with adequate adjustment controls) is better than hard gating. The Symetrix 528 hard gate is especially maddening because it tries to perform the function with just one control. The addition of a depth adjustment would have been a big help.
I think best of all is gated recovery, which is rarely found.
What I dislike most about mic processing now is that it is apparently impossible to make gating and ducking interactive among a group of mics. This is not a problem in the analog world, especially with the 528 where nearly everything is brought out on the back.
Re: Gating
I agree with David, that downward expansion (with adequate adjustment controls) is better than hard gating. The Symetrix 528 hard gate is especially maddening because it tries to perform the function with just one control. The addition of a depth adjustment would have been a big help.
I think best of all is gated recovery, which is rarely found.
What I dislike most about mic processing now is that it is apparently impossible to make gating and ducking interactive among a group of mics. This is not a problem in the analog world, especially with the 528 where nearly everything is brought out on the back.
*edit* I am frustrated tonight by the edit time out. Oh well...
- Status