i own an 002 - do i need an outboard mic pre?

[romerom]

i want my vocals to sound as clean as possible.. the only thing the pre on the digi 002 has for me to use is that gain knob.. i was thinking about getting a pair of mercenary audio avalon mic pre's but am still sort of debating on wether or not i need one since i have the plugin inserts available to me. what do you guys use? i am basically looking for the best way to make my waveforms look a bit more even without overcompressing vocals and i dont want to do anything wrong basically..

[tele_player]

A gain knob is all you need for clean vocals, if the preamp is clean.

I have an 002, and an Avalon vt737sp. The 002 preamps are nice and clean, they sound fine. The Avalon is nice, maybe not as clean, but adds a compressor and EQ. It also cost almost as much as the 002.

[where02190]

If you want to compress on the way in you cannot do it with plugins, you need an external pre and compressor.

The 002 pre's are quite nice. they're not Avalon's, but they will do a very respectable job.

Need, no. Want, only you can answer that. It's a fine line between need and gear lust.

[John Shryock]

That's a good point - need vs. want.

I've got a 002 and I added a Mackie 1604-VLZ. So I use that for pre-amps, and then use the direct outs into the digi. So, that gives me 8 pre's... When using 8 mics, the digi inputs are my main ones, but the Mackie pre's do an excellent job for what I'm doing right now.

Also, if I need to, I can do a couple group sends into the 002, so I can use more than 8 mics.

It's worked well for me - I got the Mackie used for $550 and I think it was totally worth it.

[romerom]

i dunno.. i just want my recordings to come out as clean as possible and sorta wanna buy the right pieces of gear as i go along so that i dont have to replace something later.. i.e. i dont wanna buy something cheap now and a year from now have to buy the nicer model etc..

[IntelDoc]

Nick,

If you want to compress on the way in you cannot do it with plugins, you need an external pre and compressor.

I thought by going into a MONO AUX track with the INPUT set to a MIC PRE, then bussing that to a MONO AUDIO track with a Compressor on it, you are then writing to tape?

Just curious, that is what last months Digizine had going..
as I understood it at least?

VOCAL SETUP


-Doc

[where02190]

Nick,

I thought by going into a MONO AUX track with the INPUT set to a MIC PRE, then bussing that to a MONO AUDIO track with a Compressor on it, you are then writing to tape?

Just curious, that is what last months Digizine had going..
as I understood it at least?

VOCAL SETUP


-Doc

Recording the compression yes, but post converter. Part of the reason to compress when tracking is to allow more ehadroom and prevernt overloading the converters. Otherwise you might as well jsut put the compress on the track as an insert when mixing, it accomplishes the same thing.

Mic-preamp-compressor-A-D is the correct chain.