Gear Reviews

Sterling Audio teamed up with legendary engineer/producer Allen Sides of Ocean Way Recording to create an affordable go-to FET condenser mic, the Sterling ST6050. Recently, I was lucky enough to try out a stereo pair of the large-diaphragm mic, which features a 1'' diameter, 8 micron...

The original Apollo [Tape Op #95] is a groundbreaking unit that combines real-time UAD plug-in processing, A/D and D/A conversion, and mic preamps in a single 1RU-height box. While the original unit was designed for a project or remote studio that requires an all-in-one device, the Apollo 16 is...

Every now and then, a product comes along that sets a new bar for sound quality, features, and price. The Orion32 is a prime example. When contributing writers Tony SanFilippo and Chris Koltay contacted me to explain how the Orion32 had completely changed their games, I asked both of them to...

Never saw it coming. Another day at work at the Dock (our spanking-new studio spot in Sacramento), helping my bud John Dwyer (Thee Oh Sees, Coachwhips, Damaged Bug) spray fuzz guitar all over everything, and I'm blathering on as usual, "Gahd damn I wish I had a bunch of Death By Audio...

The Phoenix Audio DRS-EQ/500 is a 4-band equalizer in 500-series format, loosely comparable to the API 550b. Each band offers fewer frequency points than a 550b, without overlap between the bands. The two mid bands are bell-shaped, while the high and low bands are shelving. The boost/cut knobs are...

Before we get to Steve Silverstein's opinion on the newest speaker offering from PreSonus, let me butt in. After reading the first draft of Steve's Sceptre S8 review and his email exchanges with PreSonus, my own interest was roused. I decided to demo a pair myself. After careful placement...

If you are short on time and just want the thumbs up/down on the B32 Vancouver 32×2 mix bus, it gets an enthusiastic thumbs up. All the adjectives that you might find in an adult-film review are applicable to the B32: wider, deeper, warmer, thicker, flexible, big bottom, sweet top. For more details...

The original Symphony I/O was already reviewed [Tape Op #87], but Symphony is more than a converter; it is a configurable product line. With six different expansion modules, the Symphony chassis can be equipped for specific needs and applications. Two newer options for the system are the...

The original Symphony I/O was already reviewed [Tape Op #87], but Symphony is more than a converter; it is a configurable product line. With six different expansion modules, the Symphony chassis can be equipped for specific needs and applications. Two newer options for the system are the...

What's a Studio Guitar Interface? Well, the SGI allows us to take an electric guitar, or any high-impedance, unbalanced instrument signal, and send it down a balanced signal path (think mic cables, snakes, or studio tie-lines) to an amp or processor. It does so with two small, stompbox-sized...

Cakewalk has been in the news a lot lately. First, Gibson agreed to buy them from Roland. Having a guitar maker buy a DAW company is not as odd as it first seems, since Gibson also owns TASCAM, maker of interfaces and digital recording hardware. So Cakewalk becomes Cakewalk Development, and SONAR...

We always ask our gear reviewers at Tape Op to take the product in question into the studio and use it on sessions. I think this is a good thing. To me, there's not much use in the real world for key jangling in front of mics; and in the heat of a recording, I couldn't care less what...

Earthworks, while best known for its catalog of super- accurate microphones, also produces a line of microphone preamps based on the philosophy of extremely-low distortion and fast-responding circuitry. Transformerless and fully differential amplifier designs with no electrolytic capacitors in the...

The SF-2 is a phantom-powered version of Royer's discontinued SF-1 ribbon mic, which means you get to press the +48V button without feeling like you've brought about the end of humanity. After that initial high wears off, you can start to record some really, really beautiful sounds using...

Western Dynamo is a relatively new manufacturer, based in Austin, Texas. Started by J. Morris, an experienced studio tech and recording engineer, Western Dynamo aims to produce audio products using new design approaches to create useful and familiar sounding devices. The first such device is the...

Transparency comes in many colors. The Archangel is a mic preamp that seems to create its own reality of transparency - with unprecedented "passive gain" topology; cool, interesting design; and general feel of quality throughout. I got to plug this thing in, finally, after a lot of...

I'm a big fan of Arturia's soft synth collection; they have some of the best sounding and well-modeled "vintage" software synthesizers available. So I jumped at the chance to try out their new super-affordable MiniLab hybrid controller. Not because I needed another USB control...

The other day, I took a ribbon microphone made in Salt Lake City, UT by a pro audio manufacturer born and raised in Russia to a downtown Austin, TX recording studio owned and operated by a musician from Oklahoma for a mic shootout recorded by an engineer from Connecticut, so that I - a...

Building upon the foundations of the renowned SSL G Series bus compressor, Alan Smart drew on years of experience working for SSL to create the first (that I am aware of) rackmount clone of what was, up until then, only available as part of the center section of an enormous SSL mixing desk. The...