Sold!

[littlesongs]

I hope nobody minds me recycling a perfectly useful old thread.

[littlesongs]

Friday Bump!

[???????]

If the DI 'hold' deal falls through, can I call dibs please?

[littlesongs]

The DI is no longer for sale.

[littlesongs]

Rather than pollute our fragile planet, I have recycled this thread.

[trodden]

Can you tell me about the characteristics of the Tascam RS-20B? i'm interested.

edit, make that the LT sound as well..

[littlesongs]

Can you tell me about the characteristics of the Tascam RS-20B? i'm interested.

Hi Brandon,

I like it a lot. It runs the gamut from a subtle almost imperceptible vintage-like flavor to full blown thwap and boing.

It has a quick attack. The tails are not super long, but they are consistent. The perverse over the top part of it's range with give you things like the muttering robots dancing in a huge culvert effect. I like that quite a bit, but I am even more fond of Junior taking batting practice in an empty Kingdome thing. If it had a nice long decay, I would never give it up.

The limiter is cool, convenient, and far from finicky at moderate levels. Above that threshold, it has an aggressive personality and not everything sounds good if you slam it. The level light reminds me a lot of the signal indicator on a portable radio from the 80s. You can turn the input knob slowly until it shows you right where the sweet spot, ragged edge, or complete chaos resides.

I wish it had several bands of EQ, but the high pass filtering takes the big whoomps out. You can bypass it and let the bass really pound away. Well, until it just overwhelms. Hitting a DeltaLab 310 hard and blending the signals in the Tascam was pretty cool on drums. Independently controlling the amount of signal hitting the spring as well as the make-up gain was handy. Cranking the output on really low signals brings up the noise floor in a hurry, but creative use of gain stages and input matching can help work around it.

Like I said, it is a cool bit of kit and I wish I could keep it. As it stands, I've found the one rack spring I need, so the others have to find new homes.

I hope that answer made a bit of sense.

David

[RS-20B is Sold!]

[trodden]

Thank you.

and the LT Sound Echo Control?


I currently have a DOD R848 single space spring unit. It gets pretty noisy and grundgy... and the eq is useful, but the tails are too long, even on the shortest setting, which is 1 second i believe.

I'm looking for something a little more "smooth" I guess. Can't afford a Demeter!!!

[littlesongs]

You're welcome Trodden.

The LT Sound is a different animal.

It is quieter than the Tascam and has a whole lot more features, but the biggest contrast between them is ease of use. I found myself thinking about this piece of gear when I read the "End Rant" in TO #75. I understand that they were trying to cram in as many features as possible, but the tiny knobs for important things are kind of a pain in the rear end.

The reverb is not really a plate, nor even a saucer, but it also does not exhibit the traits that one usually associates with springs. In addition to the main channels, there are two direct inputs for the reverb. One sounds kinda regular and bland on most stuff, but the other is really smooth, long and rich. At the same time, you can chop the tails off using the decay knob to the point where drums sound more than a little like a Bowie tune. It is very flexible.

The delay is cool, but like quite a few pieces of 80s digital gear, you have to make adjustments in a deliberate way. In other words, little changes on the knobs register just fine, but big tweaks take a second or two to kick in. In addition to dialed in sounds, there are buttons that control the effects with charming names like "50s Slap Echo" or "Distant Mellow" that actually give you an interesting slap echo or a nice flavor that could be described as both distant and mellow.

If you love that phaser sound from the late 70s and early 80s -- think Music Man amps -- the tiny little chorus pot is a wonderland of fun. Anyone who likes that Reagan-era faux country pedal steel sound can find it with ease too. I am sure that there are other ways of approaching it and other sounds that it will make, but I always felt the overwhelming urge to write incidental music for CHIPS the few times I messed with the chorus.

Using the main channels, the EQ is straightforward and useful for shaping sounds. There is also some kind of limiter on it, but I did not push it into extreme places. Overall, there are so many ways to mess with sounds that this piece of gear is like a cross between a Swiss Army Knife and a Rubik's Cube.

Because I have owned it for a shorter time and it is such an ergonomic enigma, I've used the EC-2 far less than the RS-20B. It is a cool piece of gear, but I never found myself thinking of it as a "go to" in my set-up. I am all about simple controls, ease of use, and quick workflow. This might be the cat's pajamas for somebody who enjoys tinkering, twiddling and experimenting.

It has the same case as the early Valley People products. If you can track down one of their single space rack kits or a dead unit, you can remove the wooden sides and mount it.

I hope this description made sense too.

[EC-2 is sold!]

[littlesongs]

The auctions are done. Thanks for your questions and bids.