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So…..I have been lusting this piece of studio gear for some time:

I have a lust for rack-mount gear. Every time I see some in a documentary about scientists in their lab, in a sci-fi movie, or any time I’ve been in an actual high-end recording studio, I’ve had to excuse myself to masturbate.

A few months back I bought my first piece, a Furman power conditioner. It helps remove noise from the power in my home studio, but isn’t a signal processor. I still wanted some stuff to sweeten up the sound.

Enter the SM Pro Audio TB202 two-channel rack mount tube preamp / compressor /EQ with phantom power. I finally decided to buy one the other day (they’re only 225 bucks). But EVERY online retailer was back-ordered a month or more. Guess Santa delivered too many and has to have his elves make more. So I went on Craiglist and found one used for $125. We drove up to Santa Barbara (an hour each way), tried it out, and bought it.

When I got it home, it sounded good, but was a little crunchy on my mixer whenever we talked loud. So I ordered a new Tungsol 12AX7 tube for it, only 20 bucks with shipping. That made it sound GREAT!

First, the tube in it was old, but the guy swears he only used the unit on Sundays to record a little old lady in Pasadena at church. I have to wonder though, if that’s true, why is all the red paint worn off the front plate? That usually only happens from finger oils, from touching gear daily for a long time.)

(The guy didn’t seem particularly greasy to me. In fact, he was well groomed, and was a very polite young man.)

But the tube included by the factory is a generic Chinese 12AX7 tube. The Tungsol is a superior name-brand tube, manufactured in Russia.

When I opened the TB202 up, I was surprised to find it only has one tube in it. I think it’s interesting the manual says “hand tested 12AX7 tubes used” and it only has one tube. For two separate channels.

It looks like there’s a space on the circuit board for a second tube, but no socket for it.

I wrote the company and found out that the 12AX7 (the most common tube still being manufactured today) is a STEREO tube, with two-channel capability in one unit. The unit is made with only one tube. And both channels work fine.

Damn cool.

So, I recorded a test without the unit, and then with it. It makes a good difference, warms the voice, makes me sound more like the “voice of god”….creamier, and the compressor function clips the peaks without sounding unnatural. For only $145 bucks outlay (along with a $150 Alesis USB8 mixer/digital converter, and a $225 Rode NT1-A microphone), I have the capacity to do stuff at home that sounds like a high-end radio station. (Well, with all that gear, and my modest amount of voice and engineering talent.)

MP3 TEST IS HERE, with both before and after, back to back. (File is eight megs, 320 k 16-bit stereo MP3). You’ll really hear the difference with headphones, but it’s there on speakers too.

A FEW SUGGESTIONS: ***Use the XLR cables (not 1/4 inch cables) in and out. Will eliminate noticeable noise. Run your mic (or mics) directly into the unit, and then run the unit’s out into your mixer or digital converter. ***If you’re plugging it into a mixer, turn off the phantom power on the mixer, it might fry the TB202. The TB202 has switchable phantom power, so that will power any mics plugged directly into it that need them. ***Turn DOWN the input on your mixer. The TB202 has a pretty powerful preamp in it. ***Don’t use too much compression, it will sound unnatural. Start at about 1/3 total, and experiment. I put the attack and release boost buttons on (pushed in). ***Plug the unit in, turn it on and let it run for 10-30 minutes before recording. The tube has to warm up.

ANYWAY, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND the SM Pro Audio TB202. Order it now, get it new, when they start shipping in a month…then you’ll have the warranty, and also, it will look spiffy.

This unit is so cool, it will extend your lifespan.

–Michael W. Dean

This entry was posted by Michael W. Dean on Tuesday, January 8th, 2008 at 4:47 pm and is filed under Gear porn, MWD's Cool Stuff, Other people's cool stuff. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.