Clipping on a Venue

[Greg C]

So we've all heard that clipping in the digital world is an egregious thing. It often results in very audible artifacts. But I've found that clipping on the Venue, at least the channel preamps, doesn't seem to cause audible issues unless you're clipping pretty hard. This is with the clip indicator threshold set to 0dB. So I was wondering what's really going on when you hit clip and what the indicator is actually showing you. Are the Venue preamps designed with a soft-clip type circuit like Midas desks? Is the clip indicator showing you level in the analog domain or post A/D? Is there a bit of extra headroom in the digital domain after you hit clip in the analog domain or are they both set to clip at the same time? Curious...

Greg

[chaselangr]

Anyone know about this??? If sure like to know.

[albee1952]

The red CLIP indicators really mean that you have run out of headroom. So its quite possible to hit the red, without actually hearing any clipping(and AFAIK, this is measuring the preamp input, not converter input). Indeed, with the Venue preamps, its generally recommended to hit them pretty hard and use your ears, as the Venue preamps really sound best when running pretty hot. You might also experiment with the meter options too. In the end, if it sounds good, it IS good(and yes, I don't mind seeing a bit of "red" when mixing on the Venue series).

[Greg C]

Originally Posted by albee1952

The red CLIP indicators really mean that you have run out of headroom. So its quite possible to hit the red, without actually hearing any clipping(and AFAIK, this is measuring the preamp input, not converter input). Indeed, with the Venue preamps, its generally recommended to hit them pretty hard and use your ears, as the Venue preamps really sound best when running pretty hot. You might also experiment with the meter options too. In the end, if it sounds good, it IS good(and yes, I don't mind seeing a bit of "red" when mixing on the Venue series).

That sounds a lot like the the philosophy of the Midas guys. They designed the analog circuitry to soft clip even on the digital desks so that the distortion is relatively in audible or even "warm" sounding. So it's not uncommon to see some input clipping on Midas desks to get a particular sound, or at minimum to see the inputs running hot.