Orban OPTIMOD-FM 8600, Operating Manual

Page: 231 / 397

OPTIMOD-FM DIGITAL OPERATION
3-51
modes in the 8500-style presets. See
B
ASS
C
LIP
M
ODE
on page 3-45.
Hard Clip Shape works only in
H
ARD
bass clip mode. See
H
ARD
C
LIP
S
HAPE
on page
3-49 for a full explanation of this control.
Bass Clip Threshold works only in
H
ARD
bass clip mode. It sets the flattop threshold
of the bass clipper with respect to 100% modulation, which corresponds to 0 dB. If
the
H
ARD
C
LIP
S
HAPE
control is set above
0
, then the transition into clipping will start
to occur at a level below the setting of the
B
ASS
C
LIP
T
HRESHOLD
control. See
B
ASS
C
LIP
M
ODE
in page 3-45 for more detail.
Bass PreLimiting When the
B
ASS
P
RE
L
IMIT
M
ODE
is set to
M
EDIUM
or
S
OFT
, the MX
bass pre-limiter can intelligently reduce the bass applied to the main peak limiter to
reduce or prevent audible IM distortion. It does so when the pre-limiter’s analysis of
the program material indicates that this action is needed to prevent or minimize au-
dible IM distortion between the bass (125 Hz and below) and other program ele-
ments in the main peak limiter. The
B
ASS
P
RE
L
IMITING
control allows you to specify
the maximum amount of bass reduction that can occur. Lower settings increase bass
punch but do not protect against IM distortion as effectively as higher settings do.
There are two controls, one for Speech mode and one for Music mode, allowing you
to have separate settings depending on whether the 8600 automatically detects
speech or music input.
Bass Limiting
Like the bass pre-limiter, the main peak limiter can automatically re-
duce bass when it detects potentially audible IM distortion. The
B
ASS
L
IMITING
control
allows you to limit the amount of potential bass reduction at the expense of a pos-
sible increase in IM distortion.
Distortion Control This control determines the amount of audible distortion that
the main peak limiter is permitted to create. Higher settings can increase loudness
and punch at the expense of audible clipping distortion. Lower settings are cleaner
but may reduce punch and loudness. We prefer it at
0,
which is its cleanest setting.
All MX factory presets use this setting.
The best way to familiarize yourself with the effects of this control is by listening ex-
tensively to different types of program material within your station’s format while
experimenting with different settings of the control. Because the MX peak limiter
uses newly developed algorithms that differ from those used by past Orban proces-
sors, the loudness/distortion/brightness/punch tradeoffs are also different and it is
worthwhile to take the time to get a feel for the MX limiter’s capabilities.
Multiband Clipping This control is included to make it easier to transform existing
8500 user presets into MX presets. Like the
MB C
LIPPING
control in the 8500-style pre-
sets, this control simultaneously and equally changes the thresholds of all the multi-
band compressor/limiters. (Changing the setting of each
B
X
T
HRESHOLD
control by an
equal amount would produce the same effect as changing the
M
ULTIBAND
C
LIPPING
control by this amount.)
The
M
ULTIBAND
C
LIPPING
control is partially redundant to the
P
EAK
L
IMITER
D
RIVE
con-
trol because when the multiband compressors are producing a considerable amount
of gain reduction, both controls affect the level applied to the MX peak limiter. In
this case, these controls are effectively cascaded and their effect is additive. For ex-