square state solid state EQ

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@?,*???&?
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Post by @?,*???&? » Thu May 27, 2010 8:59 am

Jitters wrote:Can I get a little less @?,*???&? in my monitor?
lol

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Dakota
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Post by Dakota » Thu May 27, 2010 9:17 am

@?,*???&? wrote:Looks like there's $225.00 in parts here, tops. What's the design worth? Another hundred bucks. $325.00 should be the retail price here. Then again, the faceplate design could be more expensive in small runs. Maybe $400.

How much could the Chinese make this for?

Under $100.

For the TapeOp community, what's it worth?
Boo Hiss.

Street price of gear starting at x4 of parts cost and going up from there (x10) is really typical.

Skilled design, skilled labor, hand crafted - at $500, this is a steal price.

Invoking China? Personally, I go out of my way to buy locally made food and products from independent businesses, and preferentially buy American every time there is a choice.

The current economy sucks, and how we choose to spend every dollar is about all we have left for "votes" that have meaningful effect.

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nick_a
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Post by nick_a » Thu May 27, 2010 9:26 am

yeah. way to kill the nice vibe we had going, dude.

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@?,*???&?
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Post by @?,*???&? » Thu May 27, 2010 9:52 am

I'd still like to look under the hood on this thing. Joel, can you peel the lid off yours and post it's guts?

KennyLusk
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Post by KennyLusk » Thu May 27, 2010 10:06 am

I know there's gotta be gobs of attitude and color here with meaty ballsy sort of rumble, but does it retain a decent dose of dimension at the same time? (Provided of course there was dimension in the track to begin with.)
"The mushroom states its own position very clearly. It says, "I require the nervous system of a mammal. Do you have one handy?" Terrence McKenna

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Nick Sevilla
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Post by Nick Sevilla » Thu May 27, 2010 10:15 am

@?,*???&? wrote:I'd still like to look under the hood on this thing. Joel, can you peel the lid off yours and post it's guts?
No, no and no.

"If it sounds good it IS good".

Who cares what's "under the hood"...
Howling at the neighbors. Hoping they have more mic cables.

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Post by Artifex » Thu May 27, 2010 11:38 am

noeqplease wrote:
@?,*???&? wrote:I'd still like to look under the hood on this thing. Joel, can you peel the lid off yours and post it's guts?
No, no and no.

"If it sounds good it IS good".

Who cares what's "under the hood"...
This coming from the guy who's screename is noeqplease. :wink:

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Post by KennyLusk » Thu May 27, 2010 12:01 pm

Please guys, no GS type insanities here. LOL This is sacred ground.
"The mushroom states its own position very clearly. It says, "I require the nervous system of a mammal. Do you have one handy?" Terrence McKenna

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Post by Recycled_Brains » Thu May 27, 2010 1:03 pm

noeqplease wrote:
@?,*???&? wrote:I'd still like to look under the hood on this thing. Joel, can you peel the lid off yours and post it's guts?
No, no and no.

"If it sounds good it IS good".

Who cares what's "under the hood"...
I care what's under the hood of everything I own. Doesn't mean I feel the need to pop open the chassis of everything in my rack to investigate, but I wouldn't spend $500 on something that I wasn't confident was made well (not speaking specifically about this EQ, as I'm sure, that based on Joel's and the designers' remarks, it's solid under the hood).

I think when you buy at a certain level, from a manufacturer with a reputation for making quality shit, you don't have to worry about that stuff. Like, I know I don't have to open my Daking, or TAB stuff to know it's well made with quality parts. Doesn't mean I don't care about what's in there.

Sound is obviously paramount, but I also want to know that I'm going to get years of reasonable use out of something without the need for constant maintanence.

One of the reasons I don't waste my time with most low-end, made in China stuff.

Just sayin'.
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Post by The Scum » Thu May 27, 2010 9:41 pm

The story of the genesis of this EQ:

Like many of you, I worked my way up the ranks in terms of mixing boards. A small Mackie, a bigger Mackie, then a Soundcraft 600. I'm a drummer, and was always looking for ways to make the bass drum really stand out...and the shelving control on those desks just wasn't doing it.

So I got into experimenting with circuits. I'd built some synth modules, and an EQ couldn't be too different from a filter, right? So I tinkered. Highpass filters led to bandpass filters, that led to gyrators, that led to inductors. Many trips from the workbench to the control room, and back. Lots of iteration. Lots of flipping through old books and schematics, lots of AB listening with any other EQ that I could bring in. I eventually figured out what to look for in inductors, and I finally stumbled on an inductor that really made things sing at a surplus shop.

As the LF section came together, it became obvious that the shelf/bell switching was useful. I could get the kick drum thunderous, and get the bass guitar guttural, without getting a lot of subsonic hash...sorta like the cut & boost on a Pultec, or the hipass+shelf on a Neve. And with the LF working, I decided to try a similar structure on the HF, and found it to be similarly useful. Knowing what made the HF and LF work, I was able to use the same concepts when voicing the midrange.

The first prototypes used toggle switches for a lot of things...a 3 position toggle for low frequency, with a second toggle for shelf/bell switching. Two more toggles for high frequency and HF shelf/bell. That many toggles make things cramped and ugly. I think Ralph at Zerotronics wound up with the most mature of those prototypes.

I think the real "ah-ha" moment was looking at an Opamp Labs mixer schem, where they used a rotary switch that selected between the mic and line inputs, while also adjusting gain...it hit me that I could do the same thing to select both frequencies, and chose shelf or bell. It's a lot more elegant than a boatload of toggle switches.
I am going to talk to these guys about getting one with detents and an off position for each band.


If you can lose a frequency on each band, it's easy to build into the rotary switches. For the HF and LF, there aren't any spare positions on those switches to make an additional off, and 2x7 rotary switches are a lot harder to come by than 2x6. Alternately, we could add some toggle switches to a per-band defeat switch...this would be a customization, and not make it's way back to the general product.

Another idea that we've kicked around is a fully stepped version - replace the continuous cut/boost controls with 12 position rotary switches. The center position would be a fully off position. If there's strong enough interest, this will happen (we could call it the "model one bs"), and not add too much to the street price.
There was a post a couple months back that the designer commented on breifly, but it'd be nice to here some more info.
Any specific questions? I'll be here all night.

My favorite uses?
-One on kick, one on bass, LF boosted on each at different freqs.
-On a drum subgroup, the HF can change the way cymbals sit.
-Boosting 350 on distorted electric guitar.
-Smiley-face curve on the 2-mix.
post it's guts?
There's an "art shot" of them on our website.[/list]

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Babaluma
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Post by Babaluma » Fri May 28, 2010 2:20 am

this looks very interesting. i own a thermionic culture pullet, which is a little more for two channels, but doesn't come with the make up gain built in. i wonder how they compare?

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Marc Alan Goodman
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Post by Marc Alan Goodman » Fri May 28, 2010 9:46 am

KennyLusk wrote:I know there's gotta be gobs of attitude and color here with meaty ballsy sort of rumble, but does it retain a decent dose of dimension at the same time? (Provided of course there was dimension in the track to begin with.)
It's actually not an EQ that I would call super colorful. It's really smooth and clear sounding. Amazingly clear for the price. Due to the design I would have assumed it would be a similar vibe to my Purple ODDs or Auditronics PEQ-82, but in reality it is more powerful with less color than either of them.



On a side note, @?,*???&?, just because it only costs a computer company $200 in parts and wages for whatever chinese babies they use to make the things doesn't mean it's not worth $2000 in the store. Your idea of a pricing structure is ridiculous. Things are worth what people pay for them, not what they cost to make. And for gods sake why would you give a small manufacturer who on top of everything is an extremely nice and helpful member of this message board a hard time for marking up his product, something everyone who has ever sold anything has to do?

and Nick_A: Awesome avatar.

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Post by chris harris » Fri May 28, 2010 12:50 pm

Marc Alan Goodman wrote:And for gods sake why would you give a small manufacturer who on top of everything is an extremely nice and helpful member of this message board a hard time for marking up his product, something everyone who has ever sold anything has to do?
Because he's a bad monkey.

BAD MONKEY!!!!!

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tactics
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Post by tactics » Fri May 28, 2010 6:49 pm

@?,*???&? wrote: How much could the Chinese make this for?

Under $100.
"Manufactured in China under 100% genuine sweatshop conditions*"

*conditions may vary.
cleantone wrote:
Microphone Case, Black, Plastic N/A $30.00
What is this case like? I've been thinking about getting one.

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Post by @?,*???&? » Fri May 28, 2010 8:34 pm

Honestly guys, I'm not giving this guy a hard time. I'm interested in what is inside this thing.

Knowing how little there is under the hood of some great pre amps, it's alarming to thing that R&D should be rewarded for a lifetime. The Neve name comes to mind. Ever crack a Portico? Priced over $1K? Not even worth it.

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