Naiant Littlebox vs. Built in preamp

[carpa]

Just an opinion from you.  I'm a very happy owner of a Naiant Littlebox which I use with my R09HR.
I like very much the sound of this preamp which I use with a couple of Naiant omni mics.
The quality of Littlebox compared to R09HR's stock preamp is just like day and night to my ears (and R09HR is quite good anyway).

What I need to know, in order to give an advice to a friend of mine for a purchase, is  how such a preamp can compare with the internal preamp of more expensive recorders than R09HR.

Some options may be Marantz PDM661 (unmodded), Fostex, Tascam and other recorders with xlr mic input.
I'm interested in opinions in terms of pure audio performance; apart from this some may prefer a two piece options (like I do), some would lean towards having one piece of gear to carry around, but this is not the main point.

I'd only like to know wether any of you has had the possibility to make a comparison and give an advice.

thanks a lot in advance

c

[stevetoney]

Since the Naiant is a very new product (only a few months), you may not find anyone that has done the direct comparison that you're asking for. 

However, the Naiant littlebox has been compared with, and stood toe-to-toe with, a PSP and a Grace V3.  Look elsewhere in the forums to find the results.  These are world class preamps that are greatly respected and sought after here on TS.com. 

You're asking if the internal pre's of stock boxes compare favorably, but most of the people on this forum prefer to have their stock preamps upgraded upgraded by Oade and Busman for improved noise floor and general improvement in sound quality/soundstage. 

By reason of deduction and without even doing a direct comparison, I'm pretty sure that the Naiant sounds quite alot better than the stock preamps in those products.

[ninjadave]

what about modded Marantz 661 (oade) vs. a good preamp, i noticed alot run preamps in front of these modded recorders but aren't the mods supposed to mirror a much better pre which means you can effectively eliminate the outside pre in the chain? i know some like the sound of certain pre's or maybe its a battery issue (can run mics longer) but then why have modded recorders if you are not relying on their pre at all? could it be some mics are not hot enough and some gain is still needed outside the recorder? i'm especially interested in the modded Marantz 661 as its seems to be a great setup running mics into it directly for a somewhat stealth setup. is there a battery issue with this setup, say with Milab VM44 links or nevation MCE400's? is it almost necessary to run MIC IN vs. LINE IN with no outside pre even at super loud gigs? i guess it depends on how hot the mics are ? anyone running the Milabs with a 661 directly in and are they hot enough to run line in or is mic in the only option, even for loud gigs? thanks for any help. i'm thinking of ditching my current setup but i need something as stealth as possible and the 661 seems like a good fit that going with a tiny or little box and say an R9 and Tascam DR-2d? much more equipment to crotch. thanks for any info.

[darby]

having ran my 680 with my V3, Littlebox and straight into the stock internal mic preamps
I can honestly say that yes, there is definitely some improvement over the internals
for the price the Littlebox just can't be beat

[page]

However, the Naiant littlebox has been compared with, and stood toe-to-toe with, a PSP and a Grace V3.  Look elsewhere in the forums to find the results.

For clarity; that test was done using a version of littlebox that is not the general production version; different opamps.

By reason of deduction and without even doing a direct comparison, I'm pretty sure that the Naiant sounds quite alot better than the stock preamps in those products.

While I think AD chipsets have come close to par, I agree that there is still room to go in gain stages.

could it be some mics are not hot enough and some gain is still needed outside the recorder?

As I understood it, the original reason for a pre-amp was twofold;
1) I need X gain to get above the medium noise (cassette, reels, etc) and utilize headroom.
2) My internal gain was introducing more noise then an outboard pre-amp, thus I got cleaner signal by having an extra box.

Having low-output mics increases the dependancy on both, while having hot-output mics generally limits your technical concerns to the later.

having ran my 680 with my V3, Littlebox and straight into the stock internal mic preamps
I can honestly say that yes, there is definitely some improvement over the internals
for the price the Littlebox just can't be beat

I suspected as much. 

[wmacky1]

However, If doing "Nature recordings", the internal Preamp noise specs of the 661 appear a little better than the littlebox. The same appears true of my Sony M10 unless the littlebox "transformer option" is utilized.