Hi everyone,

I am currently intrigued by the Safe Sound P1. Sounds Like a great unit and I've read lots of glowing reviews. My question is what exactly does the explander do? Some people have said it can correct for a poor sounding room, that would be a god send. If so, how might it be utilized during tracking? should it?

Also, I am considering matching it with a transformer balanced Speck ASC, would this be a solid pro channel? Would the Speck transformer and expander enable me to add a little more "color"?

love this site by the way, great reviews

Thanks

Opus...welcome!

Listen, I sell Safe Sound Audio in certain areas of the world (North America and now Australia to be exact) so remember I'm biased. But I can answer your questions!

The expander is a simple one knob circuit, and if you know the difference between a typical gate and expander maybe you know this...but this expander doesn't "close" like a gate. It attenuates the signal a fair amount (20dB) but maintains a very natural response by using this method. Also some gates when they open too quickly can cause a "click" or distortion while opening.

The P1 does not suffer these side effects.

More info is available by reading the white paper, if you have a minute to read this stuff. The owner of Safe Sound Audio is a very thoughtful designer, in fact he's a former Neve employee located in the UK.

http://www.asuc33.dsl.pipex.com/whitepaper...aper.htm#expand

Hope this helps. When reviewers say it's easy to forget it's on while tracking, they're right. It can be very transparent.

The Speck is an excellent EQ and coupling it with the P1 is a great idea for a complete channel strip! I currently use some old dbx242 eq's in my setup for my 2 "go to" channels but yes, that transformer would add nice color as well. Vince is a great designer as well!

War

Thanks Warren, I think I get what the expander does. That white sheet was really informative.(when it wasn't over my head )

I see that you also sell the Toft units. How would you sonically compare them to the P1? Obviously they have some different features, but from what I have read both pres use the same chip set. I'm still trying to figure out if I need a stereo channel or not. If I do the ATC-2 fits nicely into my budget.

Thanks

Hello,

I've only had a couple of hours to play with my P1 (does that sound bad) and the expander was barely touched, but the mic pre and compressor are well worth the money. I'll know more in about two weeks when I really get through reworking my studio.

peace
bford

bford...glad you're diggin' the P1!

Well, the Toft unit's preamp is maybe not quite as full sounding as the P1, but they're not miles apart. They do utilize the Burr Brown INA217 chip for the mic pre design.

The Toft's compression is more obvious than the P1's. The P1 can be very invisible in operation, and can do some hardcore compressing when called to the task. The Toft's compressor section is more crunchy in comparison.

I would rather use the P1 during tracking and the Toft during mixdown to smash some drums etc. This isn't to say the Toft can't be dialed in on some softer settings, but seems to shine more on things like drums. I must admit, I've not used the Toft as much as the P1's though as I use two of the P1's every day.

Where the Toft unit truly shines is in the EQ. That EQ section is worth the money itself...!

War

Strangely. I am in the same boat as you. I have owned one for about six months now and have used it around three times. I just haven't had a lot of time in the studio for a while.

I used it with a Rode NT2 as a drum overhead whilst I was in the studio and a friend was recording his drums with a bunch of average mics to a laptop. I set up the overhead and ran the P1 as the micpre straight into his audio interface.

He phoned me later and said he sacked all the other tracks other than the kick drum and just went for the Rode/p1 combination. Nice and clean. airy and clear..

Great Mic preamp which couldn't be made by a nicer guy.

Rimmer

Personally, I feel the expander & comp are worth the price of admission alone on the P1. The preamp was nice, and while not outstanding like the expander & comp, certainly handy to have around.