MTRX Studio clicks

[Reckless Erik]

Strange behaviour from the MTRX studio. When adjusting the mic input gain the MTRX box emits clicking sounds as if a relay is switching as the gain is increased/ decreased. This click is quite loud and as I record in the same space as the MTRX unit can be rather annoy when I need to ride the mic gain! Anyone else here noticed this? Surely it must be a fault?

[SomeOtherGuy]

It's normal behavior, there's no way to adjust gain without triggering the relays.

[Reckless Erik]

What? That is a serious no no Avid. Can they be changed?

[uptheoctave]

Originally Posted by Reckless Erik

What? That is a serious no no Avid. Can they be changed?

Nope.

You'll need to use an outboard preamp.

[LDS]

The clicking is really just associated with stepped gain controls meeting any offset within the signal. It affects a lot of stepped designs, from the ye olde' Neve 34128, through to the UAD Apollos, or Digidesign Pre, most modern digital live consoles, a lot of grace designs preamps, even extremely expensive Studer OnAir broadcast desks suffer from it.

You can avoid it by using an analogue preamp with variable gain control rather than a stepped control, but you also lose the ability to link channels/match gains with a high degree of accuracy. It took some time, but I have more or less gotten used to timing gain trims so that they fall within silences, as it can help reduce the clicking quite a lot.