Greetings,

I do not post on GS anymore unless I'm doing a photo diary of something crazy I'm building for someone. Now that I'm also a "gear manufacturer", I no longer feel good about discussing gear which is difficult because I really love gear and I have very strong opinions about it. I did, though, want to chime in a bit on the calibration since Mastering Engineers are purchasing these units.

The default calibration is done at 4 set frequencies. 1k, 10k, 12.8k, 16k
Plus, I sweep around to look for anomalies that may jump out and, thus, require a different set of tube.

The reason I mention this is that Eric and I have to match 8 gain stages (though the max at any given time is 6 and could be as low as 4) using parts that can have big tolerances - sometimes as high as 20%.

Now, the unit might be dead on at 2k but could have a .2db "drift" at 2.2k. It could drift that much in the other direction at, say, 4k and so on.

To get the unit to do what we envisioned it doing just required the use of vacuum tubes - there was no other way around it - none. The non-linearity of the tubes are the foundation of the unit's character. It's like dating the most beautiful woman in the world that also just happens to be crazy - it is a real trade off.

To deal with all of this, there are 5 sets of "trimmers" that set L/R balance, top end, air, and trimmers to set the balance on the two saturation AX7's. This allows the unit to be re-calibrated as the tubes age and for easy replacement of tubes.

We have not made this info readily available just yet but plan on a series of youtube videos that will allow someone with nothing more than a screwdriver to calibrate their units. The concern, as you can well imagine is doing this in such a way as to ensure that no one ever ever ever hurts themselves. Frankly, I'd rather work at Walmart than see someone injured fiddling around with one of these.

With all of that said, if you happen to have one of these and you want to pop the lid off and have a look around like Holger did (thank you so much for buying one of these) then I'd strongly suggest that you first unplug the unit, turn the unit to its "on" position and let it sit for at least 30 minutes. There is a mechanism in the unit that slowly drains the high voltage capacitors when the unit is turned off. Even after doing this, approach it with caution. As they used to tell us in the Army, "treat every weapon as if it is always loaded".

As always, I so appreciate our customers and those that have shown interest in our products.