[M Lawrence]

like i said, if you really have to have tubes, & you want a toolbox style processor, you can pick up the mercenery edition avalon 737 for $1700, and it'll piss all over the hhb/tla stuff. you get a phenomenal mic/instr. pre, a great tube eq , and though its's only a 1-trick pony, a great sounding tube compressor. guys like steve albini & bob clearmountain stay away from the hhb/tla stuff like the plague. just 'cause a piece of gear has tubes in it (no matter how many, at the end of the day, the tubes don't cost that much), doesn't mean it's any better than gear that doesn't; it's just different.

in the under $1200-1500 range, the rnc is a quirk of nature, & just happens to be the only usable (& quite good sounding, as well) compressor for under that mark. the 1st, imho, great compressor you hit, at $1200, is the "distressor", which absolutely rules, & it starts to go drastically up from there ( though, peavey, oddly enough, make a very usable tube compressor, and a mic pre as well, & they both sell for just under a $1000, but they're still not in the "great" league.) and 1 other thing. if you see that the really good components start at $1500-2000, on their own, wouldn't you be a little leary of some of the "toolboxes" that cram everything in for the same, or less? well you should. look at the manley voxbox, for instance. when you start putting in more than one high quality component, it'll start costing $4000 & above. there' no way around it.

so anyway, after you've picked out a mic pre & an a/d converter, you pretty much only have enough $ for a rnc. and if it's a good enough compressor for albini, i'm sure it'll do the job for you. don't try to get everything you need for $3000. buy the best components (within reason, don't go buy a prism a/d converter) you can for the amount you have, & upgrade the rnc when you have more cash. and my vote is still for the great river. at $1000 a channel for a neve 1073 mic pre (the longer you're around, the more you'll hear engineers, almost 1 out of 3, mention this unit as being the one they'd keep if they could only have 1), you're not only getting phenomenal quality and value at the same time, you're getting the classic sound of so many of the great albums that were tracked on the old neve consoles of the 60's & 70''s. and there were no tubes in those channel paths! good luck.

sorry, that might have been .08¢.

ml