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instruments within acoustic environments that is subjectively pleasing so as to develop keen awareness
that will contribute to a reliable data bank. Humans who have not experienced enough “natural”
sound may well have a flawed data bank! Quality recording equipment should be capable of retaining
“natural” sound and this is indeed the traditional measuring stick. And “creative” musical equipment
should provide the tools to manipulate the sound to enhance the emotional appeal of the music without
destroying it. Memory and knowledge of real acoustic and musical events may be the biggest tool and
advantage any recording engineer may possess.
One needs to be very careful when one hears traces of distortion prior to recording because some flavors
of distortion that might seem acceptable (or even stylish) initially, may later prove to cause irreparable
damage to parts of the sound (for example, “warm lows” but “harsh sibilance”) or in louder or quieter
sections of the recording. Experience shows that mic preamps and basic console routing paths should
offer supreme fidelity otherwise the engineer has little control or choice of recorded “color” and little
recourse to undo after the fact. Devices or circuits that can easily be bypassed are usually better choices
when “color” is a consideration and this particularly is an area where one might consider comparing
several such devices. Beware that usually deviations from linearity carry at least as much long-term
penalty as initial appeal, and that one should always be listening critically when recording and generally
“playing it safe” when introducing effects that cannot be removed.
1. Tsutomu Oohashi, Emi Nishina, Norie Kawai, Yoshitaka Fuwamoto, and Hishi Imai. National
Institute of Multimedia Education, Tokyo. “High Frequency Sound Above the Audible Range,Affects Brain Electric Activity and
Sound Perception” Paper read at 91st. Convention of the A.E.S.October 1991. Section 7. (1), Conclusion.
2. Miland Kunchur,Depart of Physics and Astronomy, University of South Carolina. “Temporal resolution of hearing probed
by bandwidth restriction”, M. N. Kunchur, Acta Acustica united with Acustica 94, 594–603 (2008) (http://www.physics.
sc.edu/kunchur/Acoustics-papers.htm)
3. Miland Kunchur,Depart of Physics and Astronomy, University of South Carolina.Probing the temporal resolution and
bandwidth of human hearing , M. N. Kunchur, Proc. of Meetings on Acoustics (POMA) 2, 050006 (2008)
Specifications
Stereo Outputs (unless otherwise specified, frequency is 1 kHz)
Max input level
Channels 1-8 , Fader at 0dB
+25.4 dBu
Channels 9-24, Max input, level trim at 0dB
+25.4 dBu
Max Output level
Any combination of inputs
+25.4 dBu
THD+N
Channels 1-8, fader at unity, BW <10 Hz – 80k Hz,
+20 dBu, 20 Hz
0.03%
+20 dBu, 2 kHz
0.003%
+20 dBu, 20 kHz
0.02%
Channels 9-24, trim at unity, BW <10 Hz – 80k Hz
+20 dBu, 20 Hz
0.03%
+20 dBu, 2 kHz
0.004%
