From RAP...


Well, I put the RNP thru some of its paces yesterday and it's a serious
contender. Lotsa neat little touches. When you hit phantom power, the phantom
power light blinks, the output is muted, and the phantom power is ramped up (or
down, depending on the phantom power switch position). No popping whatsoever.
The polarity invert works on the mic inputs, the DI inputs, and the insert
jacks, so it's easy to do a simple polarity invert, even on unbalanced
equipment.

The sound is making me crazy; how did Mark make it sound like there's lots of
iron in the path, but the top end still sounds sweet and clear, and very
extended? It's big sounding, but it's also transparent; how can that be? Last
night, I tried it with the following mics on my voice for just a few minutes
each:

Behringer ECM8000
Audix TR-40
Beyer M201
Shure SM-57
Coles 4038
RCA 77DX
RCA 44BX

Plenty of gain available with all of them, and the sound was magnificent. The
ribbon mics loved this little box. The Shure SM-57 surprised me (although the
57 is always surprising me). It REALLY sounded good as a vocal mic thru this
box, with almost no proximity buildup or popping, even at point blank range. The
RNP has a character, but it doesn't jump out and hit you in the face with its
sound.

With nothing plugged into the inputs, you could hear a little hiss in the +60
and the +66 dB sections of the 12 position gain switch, but the hiss was very
low level and smooth. Below 60 dB of gain, I couldn't hear any noise, but that
may just be me. It's a lot heavier than the RNC and Mark has used just about
every inch of front panel real estate, but it's laid out thoughtfully, and
everything is easy to get to.

Alex will be here today, so we'll really get a chance to put the RNP thru its
paces.

Harvey Gerst
Indian Trail Recording Studio
http://www.ITRstudio.com/


Peace.
Carmen

..... more .... please ....




when can we buy it?

$$$ ?


/Mats

I just got an errection.:eek:

okay... how about using some real mics [aside from the coles/rca]... and i didnt know it was possible for a mic pre to reduce a mic's proximity effect and plosives, i find the review a little bunk.

Those were Harvey's preliminary impressions, he should be doing more complete tests with his son shortly.

The mics he used are good choices for some basic evaluations. Small diaphragm omni condensors have higher self noise than most other sorts of mics, are they a workable proposition here? Does it have enough gain for ribbons? Is loading going to be an issue with ribbons and dynamics? (The SM-57 is a very different mic working into different loads.) None of these concerns really could be fully evaluated with a large diaphragm condensor. And if it sounds good with these "non-real" mics, don't you think it's also going to sound good with more deluxe ones?

The proximity thing is interesting. I would hazard a guess that it might reflect a very linear response in the bass, but that's just a guess.

Bear

...ahem...if harvey says its gonna werk...well....its gonna werk...now aint it....grggt grggt grggt grggt

Last night, Alex and I had a chance to continue testing the RNP, this time in
the big studio, comparing it to the NV and the SST-1. We started with the
TLM-103 as our basic reference mic. With me talking point blank into the mic
(slightly off axis to avoid popping), the RNP seemed a little fuller in the
lower midrange than the NV and the Millennia Media SST-1. Kicking in the
transformer on the SST-1 got it a little closer. The RNP had a little more "air"
in the top end as well. Alex described the RNP as "rich-sounding", almost
"scooped", although it wasn't.

We switched to the SM-7 and got similar results in the high end - more "air" and
"detail" than the NV or the SST-1. We both loved the output muting and phantom
voltage ramping feature on the RNP.

We moved on to the DI section and that's another area where the RNP really
shines. Alex has been using the NV and the SST-1 as his primary DI boxes. We
plugged a cheap Fender Squire bass (w/flatwounds) into it and a wonderful tone
came out. Rather than the low, punchy "whump" sound we got from the other
preamps, this sound was more of a "bap" sound with the front end of each note
more articulated, and the sound seemed to sustain better, and it still had the
low end of the other preamps. Definitely a very different tone and very useful.

One of my favorite bass tests is a "walkup" and a "walkdown" at the 12th fret of
the low E string, walking down to the Db and then walking up to the E again,
listening for the differences in pitch. Some preamps will blur the tone so
badly, you can't tell the difference between an Eb and a D. No problem with the
RNP, although the NV was a little more defined on this test. The tone was very
different between the two preamps; one "bapped", one "whumped". IF the bass
line needed a lot of definition, the RNP's "bap" sound is definitely a great new
tool in our audio arsenal.

Once my eye is back to normal (I had eye surgery Monday), I hope to actually run
some measurements on this puppy.

Harvey Gerst
Indian Trail Recording Studio
http://www.ITRstudio.com/

grggt
Thank You !


if the price is cool like the RNC, I must have..
must have now....

Anyone know what this looks like? Would it be rackable with one of the Funk Logic casings?

It's the same size as the RNC.

Fletcher will have them for
$475.00 at
http://www.mercenary.com/fmraudio.html

all the specs are there...
Peace.
Carmen

Go here and follow the links...

You'd never know how good the FMR gear is by looking at it. I'm going to have to get some nice shiny Funk Logic stuff in my racks if I'm to pursue paying clientele.

Bear

That's why it takes all kinds to make a world - I don't like the Funk Logic stuff except as kind of a joke, but I don't have a problem with an RNC sitting in the middle of 1176's, Manley, and Tube Tech compressors.

I've got no problem with the visuals when the gear sounds that great. Someone on one of the boards was talking about some hip hop artist having been told he had great gear in his racks, but the artist was let down that there wasn't any Avalon stuff with the shiny polished faces. Avalon stuff is great, but the other stuff doesn't sound as good since it doesn't look as good?! This is why I think I would need the Funk Logic stuff to fool some clientelle.

Okay, here's the unasked question, how do the Sytek's fare against the RNC? In terms of cost per channel, we're in the same league. This is probably going to be the most important comparison for folks shopping 4 channels of pre's for about $1000.

Bear