I hope the JJs work out for you. I don't know if I ever got around to testing them in a mic pre, but if they have the same effect there as they do in a guitar amp, they should darken/thicken things up quite nicely. I never did find that other Mullard, either- I can only assume the universe ate it. Or, more likely, my old band room, or it got lost when I moved.

FWIW, the DIs and the line inputs (rear panel) on the Focusrite do go through the input transformers, which is not always the case with every preamp. I don't know how often you plug in a synth or take a bass direct, but it's worth knowing. They're not random offbrand iron, either, they're expensive Lundahls. The various iterations of blue Focusrite boxes are all based around the same preamp circuit, which really was designed for them by an ancient Englishman who now lives in Tejas, for whatever their lineage is worth. And if you ever need 80dB of gain for something, because you decided to mic a nylon string with an SM7 or whatever, it's there.

I can't say I've run into one in the wild outside a GC demo room though, so I can't offer any personal anecdotes about ISA-series Focusrite gear. I would expect it doesn't suck, though, as they've been making the things for quite a while without any significant changes to the basic design.

I am sure I will like them much more than the prior tubes. And I could use some fatness/darkness, for sure. I always feel like my tones through the US-1800s pres are a little too thin and have felt much better about the tones I was getting through the MPA, and I am hoping for similar results with the PA-2 now that it's got some decent tubes in it. Everywhere I have read says that switching out the stock tubes (I dunno if those are them) makes the biggest difference in tone and that they are actually quite decent if not even nice preamps when at their fullest potential.

Speaking of tones through the MPA, here's the best guitar tone that I think I have got to date:

http://cryingmanrecords.bandcamp.com/tr ... mate-blake

My bud Colin's LP into my 800 mic'd up with an i5 and mk012. Sounds pretty fucking massive, IMO.

I never did like the i5 on guitar, the mids don't jive with me. Maybe it isn't compatible with my guitar speakers. Glad it's working for you though.

I'm still having the SM57 as a guitar mic staple.

I'll check that tone when I'm at home.

When I use the i5, it's usually as a compliment to another mic (typically a condenser) that's catching a lot of mids and highs and whatnot. The i5 has pretty beefy lows while still remaining real tight, IME.

Also, I REALLY want a good sounding SM57. Like, almost more than any other piece of gear. I am not really big on the Beta 57, for whatever reason. Maybe I've just yet to use it correctly, but I think I would be much more happy with an SM57. I feel like the Beta has a narrow bandwidth or something? It doesn't seem to pick up much low end. However, I have really liked it as a bass amp mic for picking up the nasty pick attack and scrape of distorted bass.

The Betas are a different animal. They're brighter, for one, and much hotter output. They use an entirely different capsule than the normal 57/58. They don't really sound that similar, IMO. Plus, the windscreen is going to affect the proximity effect compared to a standard 57. I've heard good things about the Beta 57 on snare drum, and a friend of mine has one... I think he usually uses it for that.

Despite being just about the most prosaic piece of gear on the planet, there's actually debate about which iteration of the SM57 sounds better. There are people who insist older MIA SM57s badged Unidyne III (which is the capsule type) are objectively better microphones somehow than other MIA ones without the Unidyne III labeling or current-production MIM 57s. There are also people who claim the former crowd is talking out their arse, and that they're all the damn same, and that any variations between them are likely as not to be from normal variations due to manufacturing tolerances, because face it- they're an $80 dynamic mic that's been in production since before Europeans colonized the Americas.

My only advice with 57s would be to find one from a reputable dealer, as there are Chinese fakes floating about. Yep, fake 57s. (I suppose it makes sense- they do sell an awful lot of them.) Alternatly, you can pay $200+ on Ebay for a beat-up 30 year old one.

I too have had a lot of luck with the Beta on snare. It is killer for getting that CRACK! sound. It's pretty wild comparing that and the i5 on top of a snare. They are about as different sounding of microphones as could be. The Beta however, definitely hypes the hi hat a lot more than the i5.

What I ideally would like to do, is get to sit down with a bunch of SM57s and pick one or two I think are really rocking. When I talked to Jesse Cannon and Andrew Wade at those recording classes I was going to a few months ago, I was always asking them about mics and shit. They both said they essentially did this, and labeled the ones they like with their specific character traits, claiming there was a pretty large difference in sound between microphones from the same date of manufacture. This does not surprise me, considering the mentioned manufacturing tolerances of an $80 microphone.

Yeah, the i5 has a pretty tight pattern that's very nice for keeping hats out of the snare. That's a great trait for a snare mic to have. We used one on the last run of Garda stuff that was recorded in a proper studio and never released. A 57, by comparison, is much fussier about hats and there's a lot more dicking around with placement to be done. The eternal battle of hats vs. snare mic does force one to look at the kit more holistically rather than a bunch of disparate elements like a drum machine. You're stuck with the hats whether you like them or not, so do they contribute to the sound in a positive way, or at least one you can live with? And bringing a separate hat mic into the picture muddies the waters further, especially when you start panning the hat mic.

Re: variations between 57s, I'll back them up on this. I had a bunch of them at one point and they all sounded different. It got even more ridiculous when I'd get together with gearhead friends to record stuff, as we'd wind up with a small mountain of the things and had to keep them sorted.

It's not a bad idea if you have more than one of something to test them and label them. A friend of mine I used to record a lot with back in the day had a set of Oktava 012s with multiple capsules, and we found audible differences between them on a number of sources- they were pretty far from a matched set. I've run into AKG D112s that don't sound alike either. Some things can be more-or-less interchangeable, but 57s are not one of them.

How is the Beta's off axis rejection? That seems to be my priority one when it comes to snare mics. It's why the i5 is my main snare. It hypes that hat you say, as in it's letting that bastard in more? I won't even touch the 57 anymore for snares.

I know I sound like a broken record but running a 57 at its proper impedance makes a huuuuuge difference. So much so in fact that I theorize that all the old fucks who say the older 57s sound better think so because back then impedances were better matched to the mic. I will happily use just a 57 on a guitar speaker, if the impedance has been adjusted. Without it sounds messy and thin.

I'm betting you're right. The impedance of the mic input on recent home studio sort of gear, from Mackie boards on through the present, is somewhere around 1-1.2kΩ. Look at old-school big-name studio hardware- Neve, API, Trident, MCI, etc. and it's a lot lower, which is much more suited to pulling useful sounds out of a 57. Same deal with current production high end gear- a 57 through a Chandler Germanium pre sounds tremendous. Through a Mackie 1604, it's pinched, narrow, constricted, thin, whatever adjective you'd like. Now, the coloration from the transformers and whatnot in the former does make a difference, yeah, but drop the impedance on a 57 running through anything at all and you have a much better mic.

I would pipe in on the discussion, but i still record 60% of everything i do, through an old telephone.

The off-axis rejection is quite good, it's just that the mic's frequency response sort of accentuates the hi hat more than the scoopedness of the i5. It's certainly not a huge issue though, it's pickup pattern is quite a bit tighter than a traditional 57.

what're you guys running 57's impedance at? like 300 ohms? i freely acknowledge that i hate that mic, but primarily through running them through mackie boards, a 1604 mostly. i have the capacity on two of my pres to dial 'em back as far as 300 ohms.. so may be worth a whack... for gods sake, they just collect dust otherwise..

any luck adjusting a 609? may haveta give that a whirl just for shits and grins.

People usually run 57s at 600 ohms, IIRC.

Also, Dan; if you're looking to get rid of your 57s, I would be quite interested in buying them.

HAPE BRIFDAE TO PROFSCOUS

U DO MAYNE

Just got another pair of the Senn HD201s. Man, it is weird how much more i like these things than the HD280s. Fucking $20 headphones. They are lighter in weight, way more detailed on the top end, and actually, not as bass-light as they seem at first.

Mainly i got the 2nd pair though, as my first pair is tied up, strapped to my TrackIR clone thing(which makes the use of them for anything but motion capture, kind of obnoxious) with like a dozen cable ties that i don't want to continually be cutting and replacing.

The end result of which has been that i have been using the HD280s for recording, and i kind of hate them for it. For one they are weirdly heavier and prone to sliding off via their own weight/momentum, especially for drumstuff. It has also been impossible for me to get the one ear off in that *just* correct manner, to be able to hear the backing and my own painful yodeling at the same time and in the correct ratios. This and i was surprised to find that their having the cord come off of just one side of the phones(versus the 201s coming off each side and meeting in a standard oldschool "V" in the middle) to be super uncomfortable to work with when drums or a guitar need to be routed around with said cord.

All in all, HD280s, nice, but weirdly, the cheapo HD201s kick the shit out of them in every way other than low end reproduction.

I remember dan saying i might very well find it so, and well, the man was correct.

$24 shipped, everyone should have them.

Maybe I should have them. I don't have any good headphones, just ones that accomplish a job.