Art Pro Audio Dual Limiter Two-Channel PWM Compressor/Limiter

2019-11-08T08:02:14

This is absolutely a turn the knobs and use your ears compressor: It’s clean, clear, and uncolored other than the thickening and compression characteristics of the content emphasized by processing.Truly wonderful for recording, where you can tweak it to perfection for a variety of uses. Its so interactive between the gain staging and attack and release, I imagine it would be a challenge to keep optimized for a live performance setting: It does have the natural sound quality you’d want though. My guess is that with advances in high speed devices: PWM detection circuits must be much more capable than vintage hardware ever allowed, because this Limiter exhibits none of the artifacts, noise or distortion that characterize older compressors of this or similar types. It maintains a dimensionality to the signal that can allow heavy handed treatment without sucking the life out of the tone. It also has a lot of versatility, as there is significant control over the transient character with the attack and release: so you can get an LA2A like smooooth treatment of a vocal, or a more 1176 type bite to the transients with a longer attack and shorter release. Yes, I work in the box (ITB) most of the time, so I’m used to the top drawer emulations (and appreciate them) but there are times when I prefer to work with an all analog front end - mic: preamp: compressor: EQ before the ADC into the DAW: and this compressor does a great job of controlling and enhancing the dynamics. It seems like it would also work well at really crushing the signal: but that hasn’t come up in the job description of my projects yet. So far I’ve used it on vocals (including operatic singer) on percussion, drum overheads, and djembe, acoustic guitar: and it’s adjusted beautifully to each: I could/would have done it all ITB if I thought it wasn’t up to snuff. In most cases I went a little light with the Dual Limiter and added a touch of ITB compression at mixdown. I’ve used it with a U87, Beyerdynamic M88, and other great sounding but less credentialed mics into a Focusrite ISA1 with the Dual Limiter in the send/return and a line out from a UAD interface to the detector input (often unused). I’d sold off most of my hardware compressors, as they just weren’t as good as ITB emulations: so I’m very pleased to have an affordable hardware unit again that can deliver high quality results) I use all the knobs over pretty much the full range of their travel for the variety of treatments it’s capable of. Even with a ton of make up gain it hasn’t raised the noise level. A real value in this is that you can give it a signal with a huge dynamic range, and it will compress it to taste: A subtle softening of the transients or having them bite through while otherwise squashing the signal: it can be transparent or thick: either way, it is good at not altering the overall tone: it doesn’t seem to attenuate the high end, though it may sometimes seem that way, as compression will emphasize different parts of the spectrum, depending on the material. It does have a detector input: and that will be necessary for fine tuning the triggering sensitivities. Unless you're an old hand with analog compressors, there's a learning curve to getting the best use from it. Overall it gives musically satisfying qualities of compression without obvious characteristic quirks and 'color' (aka harmonic distortion - desirable or not depending on your POV) that accrue to optical, tube, VCA, or FET designs.

JAMES P.