Topic: demo'd a portico last Fri

[rokpunk]

a battery / inverter rig weighs a ton, and won't last very long if you have a bunch of powered mics flying.

chris,.. some of us ran $200, "single outlet", pure sine inverters

Yes the operative word here is PURE SINE WAVE. inverter That's because you know what the hell your talking about. I would run an inverter only if I had to, I have seen what happens to gear when an inverter goes south and it ain't pretty. But if you have to run gear on an inverter then so be it. I was just saying I would not run a high end preamp like the Midas xl 42 on a $.5 inverter because its very expensive and I would be very sad if my inverter blew up and toasted my preamp.

Chris Church

Pure sine wave inverters are available for under $500. And the XL42 is only $1500 or so...not what I would consider "very expensive" in the world of pro audio gear....in fact, it's downright cheap considering what it is.

/just my $.5 worth (WTF is $.5 anyway?!? 50 cents?)

[Church-Audio]

a battery / inverter rig weighs a ton, and won't last very long if you have a bunch of powered mics flying.

chris,.. some of us ran $200, "single outlet", pure sine inverters

Yes the operative word here is PURE SINE WAVE. inverter That's because you know what the hell your talking about. I would run an inverter only if I had to, I have seen what happens to gear when an inverter goes south and it ain't pretty. But if you have to run gear on an inverter then so be it. I was just saying I would not run a high end preamp like the Midas xl 42 on a $.5 inverter because its very expensive and I would be very sad if my inverter blew up and toasted my preamp.

Chris Church

Pure sine wave inverters are available for under $500. And the XL42 is only $1500 or so...not what I would consider "very expensive" in the world of pro audio gear....in fact, it's downright cheap considering what it is.

/just my $.5 worth (WTF is $.5 anyway?!? 50 cents?)

Asshat $.5 is Fifty cents.... I know its math and that's a hard subject for you like English is, but you will get the hang of it sooner or later. Hey I would think you know all about math since your using Meyer. Did you take the Sim course? or do you just "wing it" Oh I forgot putting up a UPA-1 on a speaker stand does not involve math 

$1,500 Is cheap? wow ok in Canada they are $2,000 or so not exactly cheap. But what do I know right! I am just a poser when it comes to sound right "rockpunk" not a very corporate name you got there.

[rokpunk]

a battery / inverter rig weighs a ton, and won't last very long if you have a bunch of powered mics flying.

chris,.. some of us ran $200, "single outlet", pure sine inverters

while that is true, it is, in fact, do-able.

absolutely, yes.

how long did you say that you wanted that lower back to be functional?
i lasted not much more than a month hauling an inverter rig for the DSD unit (at a whopping 30watts draw?)
For everything that you're talking about, in a multi-channel rig, you'd be hauling 100lb batt's. <><><<<ouch!!>>><><>

Hehe...ask Brian S. about the many car batteries he hauled into the Phish thing in VT a few years back. Talk about back breaking!
Battery power rarely matters to me as I normally have AC power available.

[rokpunk]

time to end this pettiness.
take it backstage, or create a little love thread in the open forum, if you feel it needs to be public.
keep it out of the tech forums, please.

no!!!! not backstage!
he's already filling up my PM box with silliness....please don't encourage more!

[darby]

I don't know either of you personally...
but from what I have been reading lately
I DON'T care to

like Moke said: drop it!!!!
some of us come here for KNOWLEDGE
and maybe a little entertainment
but this has gone too far 

[it-goes-to-eleven]

how long did you say that you wanted that lower back to be functional?
i lasted not much more than a month hauling an inverter rig for the DSD unit (at a whopping 30watts draw?)

The inverter is probably lighter than a v3.  With lithium, the batteries could be too.  With NiMH, less so. But I'm still lugging that damn SLA with my exeltech.

[rokpunk]

I don't know either of you personally...
but from what I have been reading lately
I DON'T care to

like Moke said: drop it!!!!
some of us come here for KNOWLEDGE
and maybe a little entertainment
but this has gone too far 

Moke never said to drop it...he suggested "taking it backstage" or to the open forum.
Thanks for your input though. I will file it appropriately.

[rokpunk]

Moke never said to drop it...he suggested "taking it backstage" or to the open forum.
Thanks for your input though. I will file it appropriately.

And yet, somehow, you are still discussing it in this otherwise great portico thread......................

as are you.

[Church-Audio]

Moke never said to drop it...he suggested "taking it backstage" or to the open forum.
Thanks for your input though. I will file it appropriately.

And yet, somehow, you are still discussing it in this otherwise great portico thread......................

I love Neve preamps the last time I was in a studio in Hamilton, Ontario called Grant Avenue studios. They had 4 Neve preamps with the eq sections. I kept using them on every dam track. I would say hey lets try the neve on the kick drum lets use it for vocal lets use it for this and that. They are the most musical preamps ever made IMO. The portico is a preamp that is made out of components that are modern. In my opinion you can not discount Rupert's design.. Even in a modern preamp the sound is still Neve not the vintage Neve everyone expects but, I would still put it up against the best modern preamps out there and I am sure it would stand up on its own.

 Lets face it in a world where everyone stamps there product name on something but few actually still make it. Neve has never been one of these companies if it says Neve, it's a Neve not a sorta neve. I personally have never used a more musical preamp then a neve pre.

I aspire to one day build something that would be even close to one of his designs. Time will tell if I do it. But as a maker of preamps I can say that me and every other maker of preamps looks up to Rupert Neve. He is a pioneer in the preamp world. I think it's unfair that people are comparing an 1073 against this preamp there is nothing similar about the two. Its an unfair statement to make, the people that are buying these and expecting an 1073 would be better off shelling out the $4,000 or so for a nice set of 1073's but this ain't a $4,000 preamp. I think people have always been trying to get that Neve sound.. With modern components it just ain't going to happen. You need the old parts to get that nice Neve fat sound IMO.

Chris Church

[rokpunk]

thanks for the review. i wish more people would give the (imho) better sounding XL42 from Midas a chance.
plenty of people are moving to the Portico...but i have still yet to hear of anyone using an XL42 in the field.

For what tapers do the midas is cool but is requires one to have access to electricity.  Not ever taper has that access at a show.  99.99% power their rigs via some form of battery wheather its a SLA, Lithium ion, AA's, NIMHI.

betcha, with a little creativity, a battery pack could be made to power it. never done it for an XL42, but i can't think of a reason why it couldn't be done.
i'm considering picking one up for my multitrack rig....if i do, i'll play around with powering it.

If Midas made an 8 channel version of the XL42 I'd be all over it, no question.  Now you've got me thinking.  I might be able to grab an XL42 and run a couple of ambients into it at a show we're doing next weekend...

almost forgot 'bout this 8 channel matrix mixer from Midas.....

http://www.midasconsoles.com/xl88.html

[trajhip2000]

I do like how it reduces the room sound and captures all the good tone of the instruments. Would I sacrifice some ambiance and HF detail to achieve this? I think so.

good point - the venue I do most of my recording in these days is (unfortunately) a restaurant/bar that's all glass and concrete, so there's a lot of room sound. I'm wondering whether using the Portico in that situation might indeed give me a better sounding recording because I lose some of the room...

Steve

[Lil Kim Jong-Il]

I do like how it reduces the room sound and captures all the good tone of the instruments. Would I sacrifice some ambiance and HF detail to achieve this? I think so.

good point - the venue I do most of my recording in these days is (unfortunately) a restaurant/bar that's all glass and concrete, so there's a lot of room sound. I'm wondering whether using the Portico in that situation might indeed give me a better sounding recording because I lose some of the room...

Steve

I've used the Neve only a few times, always with silk enabled and each time I've been extremely happy with the sound and level of detail in the tapes.   Coincidentally, each time I've run the Porticio it has been in really crappy rooms.  I didn't yet make a connection.  Now I'm thinking I should run without silk mode when I get it in a good room or solo acoustic guitar. 

Thanks for posting that review. 

[trajhip2000]

I ran it again last night on the individual guitar and bass amps, and it sounds very nice, esp. on the electric guitar - big and bold without being too edgy or painful. I was concerned that the distinctive Neve sound might not mix well with my stereo pair, but in a quick test it integrated pretty nicely...

Steve

[THE NIZ BIAAAAACH!]

I got mine 2 weeks ago and have run it 4 nights. My impressions of it are that for on stage instrumental music it has way more detail then most of the other pres I have run. (I've run almost everything portable)  Also it has amazing imaging when run on stage there was a real sense of space and distance between the instruments, once again much more than any other pre, I've run.  I ran it in silk and without.  My impression of this is that the silk is very warm and colored, thick, big, like a sweatshirt fresh from the dryer on a winter night.  With out silk I found it to be much more transparent, with more pronunced highs, more focused tigher, punchier bass, a little bright.  When I ran it in larger venues ortf, it sounded like my mics were at least 1/3 closer to the source than with previous pres, while still exibiting the same forementioned qualities.  There is a Moe from the filmore denver up on cotapers.org and also etree.  It is however a 4 mic mix

[F.O.Bean]

I got mine 2 weeks ago and have run it 4 nights. My impressions of it are that for on stage instrumental music it has way more detail then most of the other pres I have run. (I've run almost everything portable)  Also it has amazing imaging when run on stage there was a real sense of space and distance between the instruments, once again much more than any other pre, I've run.  I ran it in silk and without.  My impression of this is that the silk is very warm and colored, thick, big, like a sweatshirt fresh from the dryer on a winter night.  With out silk I found it to be much more transparent, with more pronunced highs, more focused tigher, punchier bass, a little bright.  When I ran it in larger venues ortf, it sounded like my mics were at least 1/3 closer to the source than with previous pres, while still exibiting the same forementioned qualities.  There is a Moe from the filmore denver up on cotapers.org and also etree.  It is however a 4 mic mix

great post, +T