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Hi all! Is there something wrong with
the Behringer preamps like Behringer T-1953
Tube UltraGain. Their prices seemed to have dropped from 850 € to 250!!! Is it a great deal or are the dealers trying to get rid off them quickly and save their own a**.

If someone has tried one please share your opinions. Comparison to Joemeeks MQ1 would be great.

the behriger is fine.....there is no comparison in quality to the joe meek. all behringer products are cheap,that's their purpose.joe meek is pretty good quality. you may prefer the sound of the behriger though,trust YOUR ears.

most likely,that model is about to be replaced.

Take a look on harmony-central theres a few complaints of poor reliability with some of the tube ultragain products, I checked it out when I noticed the prices dropped like a stone.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: remixme on 2002-07-19 05:24 ]</font>

Hi all,

I have 2 * Behringer MAGICIAN (8 * 12AX TUBES). It's not a preamp, you can just send your signal thru it, and get more or less tube sound (no amplication).

Though the tubes should be great, found in many products cost much more, I think this baby sounds a little odd. In fact the only thing sounding really great thru it is Cymbals and hihats. When I run a bass thru it, most of the bottum end goes away (like from 150 and down). Vocal, nah, it gets fuzzy. Snare, hmm, it works sometimes. But if I make a more complex setup like eq-dist-magician-eq-compressor, it can sound cool on drumloops and synths. But then again, I think PSP vintagewarmer does the job way better.

Actually I find most Behringer products to be pure shit, expect for a 4 channel headphone preamp I have, which have served me well for years. Also i think their new digital mixer line looks promising, mostly for their low prices.

All in all, you get what you pay for. If you need a supernice preamp, you better bring your big wallet. But if you just need a preamp for doing budget productions, sure a behringer will do. Later, you can allways re-record fx the vocal again in a better studio.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Thalamus on 2002-07-19 06:02 ]</font>

The Magicaian probably uses 12AX7 Sovtec tubes, which can be found nearly in every unit that supports this format (SPL charisma, Avalon 747, ....) You could change those tubes to "Teslas" or "Mullards CV4004" to get a more "brittle" and "shiny" (Tesla) or "fuller"and "warmer" (Mullards) sound. But those tubes aren´t so cheap....

Regards,
Sunshine

I have recently discovered why behringer products are so cheap. They make a huge batch of them once or twice a year in the far east. The economies of scale mean that they can sell them very cheaply.

Unfortunately this means they run out now and then and if you wanna order one as I did the other day ( I wanted a Denoiser snr2000) I was told it could be anything up to a 6 month wait!

But they are supposed to work well and do exactly what it says on the tin.
If it blows up or breaks you can get another, and another and it will probably still be cheaper than the cheapest alternative.

Having said that, most good hardware stuff is well made so there is rarely any problem buying second hand stuff and it seems compressors, effects and these new virtual synths lose their value pretty quick so their are lots of bargains to be had if you scour the classifieds.

i got a bheringer b2 mic, and i think its good. I never had any problems with it.

we have the same prices here in Germany, which caused a mag to examine that series in depth. Result: for the price there's no reason to complain, a DBX-386 would be more transparent but severely more expensive.
But the Meek sounds completely different, so that's a personal choice as well.

cheers, Tom

Behringer gear I have seen has always been sold at "amazing discounts" i think that is more like the actual normal street price. and they have a really high MSRP so they can always have these "sales"

as for their reliability i know one guy who returned an effects unit, but he has one of their big mackie clone mixers and seems quite happy with it.

I just got an 8ch Eurorack for under $100 for using live. who can complain? it is very quiet, is working like a champ, is the size of a piece of paper, and is very light. couldn't have asked for more at that price (OK, stereo AUX sends would be nice!)

That behringer tube preamp is IMO bad. I had loads of trouble with it. Strange thing was, that it gave way less gain in my house than in the shop - we tried several times.

One problem, that didn't care for location was the vu-meters. If I gave enough volume and gain, they would jump to full speed. At my home this happened before getting anough gain to feed me Pulsar1 to 0db on the mixer (flat gain).

It was a headace. I also saw other behringer 19xx units for repair in the shop, when I travel back and forth with mine.

Immanuel

just for the record, Immanuel:
could it be some powersupply / hidden magnetic source near where you've used it in your studio ? Those analog VUs should be really sensitive to something like that.
Anyway - it's in the manufacturer's duty to take care on that.

cheers, Tom

I tried to move the pre to the other end of the house on another electric fase - gave same bad result.

Immanuel