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Rare Focusrite GREEN Range Mic Preamp/ Channel Strip with EQ, Compressor, Expander and De-esser in EXCELLENT condition. Smoke free home studio use only. Beautiful sounding Pre Amp/ Compressor/ EQ for all type of Vocals, with a great de esser. (not like most cheap de essers which completely change the sound of the voice!). Can also be used on guitars and bass.
From a review…”On voices, the EQ is simply stunning in its ability to create the desired tonality while leaving the voice sounding perfectly natural.”
Genuine reason for selling.
Please see full spec and review below.
DESIGN FOCUSAt the start of the signal path is a very low-noise mic amp, providing from 10dB to 60dB of gain, with switchable phantom power, a phase switch, a mute button, and a switchable 75kHz high-pass filter. Each of the buttons has an integral status LED, and a 5-section LED level meter peeps through its own front-panel slot above the mic amp section. If an external mute control is applied to the unit, the red mute LED comes on.Also sharing the mic amp is the NR (Noise Reduction) control, which sets the expander threshold. The expander, which operates with a 2.1 ratio, has a strangely-calibrated knob, in that it shows the worst-case noise level below 0dB on the meter; in other words, it shows how much residual noise you might expect to have left when the expander is operating. Though the Voicebox itself is about as quiet as theory allows it to be, the use of compression will reduce the signal-to-noise ratio of the input signal by the same number of dBs as the amount of gain reduction being applied. Careful use of an expander can minimise this, by applying ‘soft gating’ during pauses.As compressors go, this one has very few controls — just three knobs and three buttons. According to the graphs in the manual, the compressor has a conventional hard-knee characteristic, with user control over the Threshold, Ratio and Makeup gain being provided. The attack and release times are pre-optimised for vocal use, but there’s an auto-release function which can be switched in to deal with material that has unusual characteristics. This works by progressively slowing the release time if the input exceeds the threshold either by a large amount or for a long duration. Because compression reduces the level of signals exceeding the threshold level, a make-up gain control is necessary to restore the peak level. The remaining buttons bypass the compressor section and switch the level meter to read gain reduction.Following the compressor is a de-esser, and though the controls and side chain for this are quite separate from the compressor, the same VCA is used to restrain the signal gain. In effect, a de-esser is a compressor that is particularly sensitive to high-frequency sibilance, of the kind produced by some vocalists when singing ‘s’ and ‘t’ sounds. When these sounds are detected, the de-esser pulls down the gain, to make the sibilant sounds less noticeable. A conventional Threshold control sets the level above which sibilant frequencies are treated, and a Bandwidth control determines which area of the audio spectrum is reduced in level. Simpler de-essers compress the entire audio spectrum, which can lead to unnatural gain-pumping effects. The de-esser’s Bandwidth filter is simple to use, but is actually quite complicated in terms of design. A 3rd-order filter sets the low-pass point, with a 1st-order filter looking after the high-pass point; as the bandwidth is increased, the lower limit slides down the audio spectrum as far as 1kHz. At minimum bandwidth, the filtering applies only above 10kHz. A 2nd-order, fixed-frequency filter operating at 1kHz is used in the side-chain circuit to ensure that low frequencies do not trigger the de-essing process. “On voices, the EQ is simply stunning in its ability to create the desired tonality while leaving the voice sounding perfectly natural.” Next in line is the equaliser, configured as three bands with variable frequencies. The low and high sections are shelving, while the mid-range can be swept between 300Hz and 3.3kHz. Though this isn’t a true parametric EQ, the bandwidth can be set to normal or Notch — the Notch setting has a very high Q, specifically for attenuating awkward spot frequencies. All three sections provide up to 18dB of cut or boost, though it is unlikely that much boost would be used in the Notch position, other than to identify problem areas or to create special effects.Finally, there’s an output level control, which has an associated overload LED to warn of impending clipping. A recessed yellow LED indicates that the unit is powered up.SOUNDS TRANSPARENTIt would be difficult for the Voicebox to sound as distinctive as it looks, but it definitely rises to the challenge. However, while other vintage-style processors try to be distinctive by what they do to the sound, the Voicebox is characterised more by what it doesn’t do. You might think that the signal path on your mixer is clean and transparent, but next to the Voicebox, most mixers start to show their weaknesses. For starters, the Voicebox has loads of headroom and a very fast transient response, so everything comes out sounding smooth and natural. Abrasive sounds usually occur when circuitry can’t respond fast enough to the input signal, or can’t accommodate its peaks, but there’s none of that here. The mic preamp behaves perfectly in every way and the expander proves to be so transparent that it’s hard to tell it’s on at all. The only thing you notice is the silence between sounds.Checking out the compressor was also a revelation — vocal levels are controlled more positively than on just about any compressor I’ve tried, other than possibly a top-end Aphex, yet there’s little subjective evidence of processing, even at very high levels of gain reduction. What’s more, the compressor doesn’t seem to push the louder sounds away, as some compressors tend to do — even the most uneven performance is levelled surprisingly naturally.The de-esser, too, manages to clean up normal amounts of sibilance without causing the sound to dip or lurch — no doubt the clever filter arrangement is behind this. If you really over-process, you can hear the sound becoming just slightly dull whenever the de-esser is triggered, but when set up properly, it’s wonderfully transparent.Focusrite have a strong name in the EQ business, so I was expecting great things from the Green EQ section — and it didn’t let me down. EQs normally come as ‘gentle and musical’ or ‘firm and ruthless’, but Focusrite have managed to create an EQ that really digs into a sound and changes it, yet without making it unnatural. Even when you crank on 10dB of top end, the sound just gets crisper. It’s the same at the bass end — you can add as much warmth and punch as you like, but there’s no lack of clarity or loss of mid-range definition. On voices, the EQ is simply stunning in its ability to create the desired tonality while leaving the voice sounding perfectly natural. It might sound like magic, but again, it’s down to well-engineered circuit design and an appropriate choice of filter characteristics.
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Category: Musical Instruments:Pro Audio Equipment:Preamps
Location: London