62vauxhall
Super Member
Personally, I think an EQ in conjunction with a 3BX is bad idea. Too much alteration - overkill. It would no longer be an enhancement, it would be a distortion.
DBX 3BX Series III and vinyl... ???
- Thread starter DustyOldPile
- Start date
DustyOldPile
Vinyl Goddess
What I have noticed is that a slight midrange bump in my system is made worse with the 3bx, so the EQ is mostly to tame that. I don't plan on making a big W or anything rash.
a_retent
In memory of Trixie woo-woo
Sacrilege, aye!
They're mine, they're paid for, they sound awesome and that's not just my opinion. Ask any number of the people that have listened to them then picked their jaws up off the floor after switching the processor loop off.
Yes, I use a 3bx-ds with my audio research equipment and it really does bring life/soul back to recorded music. The key to using the 3bx is moderation. Some SACDs sound better without it i.e. Norah Jones Come Away With Me, for this I just hit the defeat button. Even a vast number of my MoFi pressings benefit from minor range expansion, crescendos and decrescendos in the music have much more realism. Impact restoration brings realistic snap to just about all percussion instruments and vocal inflections to the singer's voices.
Say what you will but I've had dbx processing equipment since 1980 and I won't get rid of them anytime soon.
vwestlife
Super Member
Only a little bit (simply as a side effect of lowering the noise floor). But there were devices specifically made to filter out impulse noise. I have one of these and it works... sort of.
DustyOldPile
Vinyl Goddess
Received the ART eq today, put it before the 3BX. Very happy with the sound. I put a slight boost in the lower midrange and a slight cut in the upper one, vocals sound more natural and less shrill now. All good!
Got a DAK-1 on the way. It will be interesting to see what it can do with some old cassettes and record surface noise. The price was right, too.
Got a DAK-1 on the way. It will be interesting to see what it can do with some old cassettes and record surface noise. The price was right, too.
DustyOldPile
Vinyl Goddess
Only a little bit (simply as a side effect of lowering the noise floor). But there were devices specifically made to filter out impulse noise. I have one of these and it works... sort of.
I hope that thing works better than the old Garrard click pop filter that I used to have.
DustyOldPile
Vinyl Goddess
Online tracking reveals that my DAK-1 is waiting for me on my doorstep! Can't wait to get home and hook it up!
I have both of these, and they work differently. The Garrard works well on low level "crackle," but lets the big ticks and pops through. The SAE works well on the big ticks and pops, but if you turn the sensitivity up high enough to work on "crackle," it cuts into the actual signal. I don't have any records that suffer from both at the same time, so I've never tried ganging them together, but that'd be a lot of processing and technology has marched on since the 70s. So if I did have one that bad, I'd probably just give up on keeping it analog, digitize it and process it in Audacity.
BTW, the Garrard unit is a fairly decent discrete component phono stage with the noise suppression turned off.
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DustyOldPile
Vinyl Goddess
I hooked the DAK-1 up last night between my phono preamp and receiver. With the knob set at about 11 o'clock, it does a very nice job of reducing the noise floor while not audibly affecting the music. Turning it all the way to 5 o'clock rolls some treble off but whacks even the crackle...might be good for old 78's or a really crackly record, but normally one wouldn't want to set it to such a severe level. Pretty pleased with it thus far...another weapon in the arsenal.
So, this SAE thing...what's the difference between a 5000 and a 5000A?
So, this SAE thing...what's the difference between a 5000 and a 5000A?
phantomrebel
Serial Tapist
I use and like the dbx stuff for my tape work, but was pretty damn surprised as well at how they can enhance a variety of sources, including vinyl. I own a few dbx encoded albums that really blow me away in terms of dynamic range. It's a shame more weren't released. I especially like the impact recovery circuit on the 3BX-DS. I've been out of the purist's school since the 80's when I was in and out of studios with my wife and saw first hand how much post work is done on everything.
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