Out of the box, analog or otherwise

[rick-slo]

What's the time table to when analog gear (beyond the microphones and preamps of course) be entirely obsolete?

Ditto for going out of the box (computer DAW) to run through outboard gear (analog or no)?

Since you are ending up back in the DAW in digital anyway when you finish up the recording, whatever that other gear does can be duplicated by the proper digital algorithms.

I know that much external digital hardware is made (most likely for profit reasons) that could be handled in the box by the newer CPUs. Or say for example that one may have a favorite Distressor that no one gets around to accurately duplicating in the box (though it could be done).

[Doug Young]

I think we're already there, and have been for some time. Many of the "character" hardware pieces, from the Emperical Labs Distressor to the Manley EQs, Neve EQs and consoles, are very well modeled by UAD. For acoustic guitar, I don't find most of these all that useful, I prefer clean, but they exist. They may or may not exactly match the real thing, but they seem to do well enough at being in the ballpark. Even for electric guitar, where there are infinite variations in distortion and the feel of different amps, the digital emulations seem to have arrived.

[jim1960]

The time in which analog gear is replaceable is already here; however I don't see analog becoming obsolete at any point in the near future. Music is about inspiration. As long as people are inspired by analog gear, they'll be a market for it.

[sdelsolray]

I spent the 2000's and most of this decade using outboard EQs for mixing solo fingerstyle guitar, including some of the best out there (e.g., Millennia Media NSEQ-2 and Origin STT-1, Drawmer 1961, Speck ASQ-T). I decided a few years ago that many of the ITB EQs are close enough to be equivalent in most respects, so I no longer use outboard EQs.

Outboard preamps are another matter. I don't see them being replaced with digital algorithms.

[Bob Womack]

In audio there is a saying: "The money is in the transducers." That means the microphones, pickups, and speakers. In analog it also included the tape decks because they also transduced energy from one medium to another.

When digital came in it was widely speculated that all of the previous analog gear was not only replaceable but suspect. A new generation of transducers and interfaces arrived. Virtually the entire previous decades of technology were eagerly dismissed by equipment manufacturers and a breathless audio press as hopelessly outclassed by new technologies and poorly matched to the new recording medium. In fact, the first USB mics arrived at least twenty years ago. Back then, I visited the Neumann booth at the AES New York convention and eagerly observed their new remotely controllable large diaphragm direct-to-USB microphones.

And then something happened: taste.

You probably don't remember when 500 racks didn't exist. You probably don't remember when to try out a new preamp, you had to convince management to buy a $400,000 console. Why? Because they only existed onboard $400,000 consoles. But after digital came in, a whole generation of consoles was discarded and replaced at the frontline facilities by a new generation of transformerless consoles. Those first, vintage, discarded console were snapped up by smaller studios who finally wanted a bite at the big name consoles at got them at cents on the dollar. But as the big name independent producers began working on the new consoles, they found they missed their old consoles' preamps. When the smaller studios began realizing they couldn't afford to keep the vintage consoles running and began selling them off, they sometimes did so module-by-module to independents who racked them up so they had a selection of API, Neve, and Trident preamps and began using this one for that job and that one for this job. At that point it was easily observable that mics interacted differently with different preamps. They'd never had it so good.

Then two things happened: 9/11 and 500 rack modules. In 2001, the attacks in New York made the music industry move out of the Manhattan recording studios and into the surrounding suburbs and bedroom communities where they hastily set up home studios with DAWs, inexpensive consoles, and their racked-up preamps. They'd bring their digital multitrack files into the expensive New York studios to mix them. Within a few months the established New York studios began to collapse. Meanwhile, a cottage industry sprung up reproducing those vintage modules in the 500 rack format. Over time we've experienced a burgeoning industry in 500 rack modules. You can get component-by-component reconstructions of the original modules for cents on the dollar, allowing any intrepid operator to grab up all sorts of vintage sounds.

All of this to say, there is an electronic interaction between mics and preamps. As of right now, classic preamps can't be miniaturized to fit into mics to allow the mic/preamp/USB thing to exist onboard with as much flexibility as we see when they stay separate. Plug-ins can't reproduce the interaction. Maybe that's yet, maybe not. So, as of now, you can get a great USB mic but you can't get a great mic into APi or Neve or Trident to USB within the body of the mic.


So, I've still got three preamp types available to me.


Bob

[Brent Hahn]

Originally Posted by Bob Womack

In audio there is a saying: "The money is in the transducers." That means the microphones, pickups, and speakers. In analog it also included the tape decks because they also transduced energy from one medium to another.

True. On a slightly lower tier, I'd say there are still no emulations of tubes, transformers and inductors that would make me give up the real thing. Yet.

[runamuck]

If one can afford a very powerful computer we're there. Many people still don't know about Acustica plugins. I have no hidden agenda here other than to be helpful.

http://acustica-audio.com/store/en

I've read of a number of people who have sold their very expensive hardware. I've never used UAD plugins but I've read of plenty of guys who say that the Acustica stuff is better. They've come up with a different type of dynamic convolution sampling and are now even making compressors that most can't distinguish from the real thing.

I don't use compressors myself but have several of their EQs (one based on an $8000 D.W.Fearn EQ, and approved of by him) and they're the best I've heard.

[jim1960]

Originally Posted by sdelsolray

I spent the 2000's and most of this decade using outboard EQs for mixing solo fingerstyle guitar, including some of the best out there (e.g., Millennia Media NSEQ-2 and Origin STT-1, Drawmer 1961, Speck ASQ-T). I decided a few years ago that many of the ITB EQs are close enough to be equivalent in most respects, so I no longer use outboard EQs.

Outboard preamps are another matter. I don't see them being replaced with digital algorithms.

I'm of a similar mind.

I own a ton of the UAD stuff. I've no complaints about it. It's good and folks can make great records with it. But my preamps simply sound so much better to my ears that it will be a rare occasion when I use the Unison pres on my Apollo interface.

A comparison a few months back has brought me around to the same way of thinking on compressors. After reading some good things about them from various sources, I ordered an Audio-Scape Opto compressor to see if it would live up to the praise. I invited a couple of friends over who both own studios because I was worried I might be listening with a predetermined bias. Head-to-head against the UAD LA2A plugin, we all agreed the Audio-Scape was a clear winner. It was smoother and warmer than the plugin. That's not to say the plugin sounded bad, just that the Opto sounded better.

I'm with you on the EQ though. I prefer to stay ITB for that. For me it's just a lot easier to get things to sit nicely together in a mix when I have visual graphs in front of me. If I was doing a lot of mastering, I don't think that would be an issue. I just took on my first mastering job as a favor. A friend is recording a punk artist and she's pretty well tapped her funds on the tracking and mixing. He asked me if I would do the mastering, and I turned him down at first for a few reasons. The first hugely obvious reason was I have near zero experience mastering for anyone other than myself, and even then it was only for sharts and giggles. I'd never release anything of my own that I'd mastered myself. Second, I didn't feel comfortable charging someone to master their music (see Reason 1). Third reason, punk is not my thing and I wasn't sure I'd do the songs justice.

The friend who asked has some mastering experience but he's come around to the notion that the guy who mixes shouldn't be the guy who masters. I totally get that. Sometimes fresh ears will produce better results. After some talking, I agreed to give one song a shot. I used the UAD Chandler Limited Curve Bender to dial in most of what I thought would improve the song. Then I used Acon Equalize to fine tune a few things, then the UAD Fairchild 670, then Maxim on the Master buss to get the level right. My buddy was impressed but more importantly his client really liked the end result. I'm not going to hang a "Mastering Engineer" shingle up anytime soon, but I'm having a bit of fun with this and it was totally unexpected. In fact, I tried really hard to avoid it. Since that day last week, I did a second song, we negotiated a price the artist could afford, and now I'm waiting for him to pass along the mixes for the other twelve.

But yeah, EQ in the box is just fine for me.

[DupleMeter]

We're already here. When you have guys like Andrew Scheps saying they've gone completely in the box there's no going back. And, with analog modeling being so good now, you can have every piece of hardware ever made...all in software for a fraction of the cost of one SSL or Neve.

I was at a studio the other day sitting at the SSL 4000E...which was being used solely for inputs into Pro Tools for recording drums & bass...& I joked with the owner: "Hey! this thing is pretty good...it sounds just like the plugin"