Hey INRI,

   I can't tell you anything about magic, but I can tell you that the MP-1 does things like this when you manipulate the tube gain levels, and combine that with the way you set your EQ, and maybe add some of the chorus effect in creative ways, you get what some would call a "magic" tone.

  By selecting the voice you want to create from, i.e. S.S. Clean Tube, or Dist Tube, there's a lot of ranges in those voices. It's all about selecting the right voice and tweaking it the way you want to hear it, and that's the key. Use your ears.

   The MP-2 on the other hand does not do the S.S. voices that the MP-1 does since it has no S.S. voice at all. Everything there is all tube voicing. It does every tube voice from crystal clean to gnarly dual rectifier tones and all points in between.

   If I had to sum it up, I would do it like this: These ADA preamps are not modelers, and they don't have DSPs. Instead think of them as extremely versatile amplifier preamps that do what no single amplifier can do.

   That's why they're legends.

I was wondering: what is the magic of these units for them to have different voicings? How can it go from sounding like a fender clean to cranked marshall? Chat GPT was brainstorming and going all about the DSP being able to change tube bias on the fly etc. But that sounds extreme. Do any of you guys have any idea how this works?


As you may have noticed Im all out fascinated by these units even though Ive never been nearer than 500 miles to one.

Hey Harley, I feel your pain my friend .

Like you, I just wanted to get recording again.  Some of this I've posted before but here's the journey for me (not quite over but it's all working very well so far).
So I bought a Focusrite 8 in/out.  It was a hassle and intermittent with my (now retired) Win7 laptop.  So I quickly swapped it for the PreSonus 18/24, basically much the same 8 in/out (slightly better controls BTW).  The PreSonus has a Universal Control app/driver which worked fine, connected easily and is very stable and consistent, moreover it sounded a bit more musical, warmer and less stark/clinical.  It also comes with Studio One software for free which works fine "out of the box" with all I needed for now.
So I needed a new PC so I went for a MSI Creator Z17HXStusio A13VGT fully loaded with 64GB RAM, and 2 TB SSHD, latest Intel chipset.  It's a gaming/creative lap top so also has high end nvida card which can share processing.  Screen is photo quality17" touch which also works well (my thought good for mixing).  So this cost around $3k USD ($4.6k AUD) but is the equivalent of the most expensive MAC book Pro (~$6 to $7k AUD).  It comes with Win11 Pro.  After getting rid of the gaming stuff (what I could easily), it's been the best computer I've ever had. Everything connects and works seamlessly (2 x USB C/thunderbolt4 lightening, USB A (3.0), HDMI, SD Card reader, and it doesn't even raise a slight sweat when recoding/mixing etc.

As a long time Windows user, I struggle to "dumb down" to use a Mac.  There's no delete key (have to go to the right and backspace ), no srcolly mouse wheel, no right mouse button or menus, to burn a CD you have to drag the file onto the CD icon and then have no control of the settings (took me ~15 frustrating mins to work that out).  I'm sure once you are used to them they are ok(ish) but then you are locked into the Mac ecosphere (proprietary and expensive).  No (or very limited) I/O connections, it's mostly all wireless or bluetooth.  I don't think they have USB C, just thunderbolt proprietary (if at all).  They don't have a USB A connector, you have to use an Apple iPad Camera Connection kit to connect to whichever I/O you use/choose.

My 2 cents worth, bight the bullet and buy the same or similar MSI that I bought with Win11. Swap the Focusrite for the PreSonus.  My gut feeling is when you install Cubase on that system, it will all work fine, but if it doesn't, just use Studio One.

Or the cheaper starting point maybe swap out the Focusrite for the PreSonus, with it's Universal Control app/driver you'll probably get everything to work with your Dell (IIRC Win 10?).  Add as much RAM as you can (it's really cheap these days).

 

so....the two closest to the rear of the unit?

IF I'm not mistaken, as I was looking in the chassis at the four transistors, I think I traced the circuit from the B channel to the two on the right. This is as I'm looking at them with the three legs pointing towards me.
If I traced the circuit correctly that is. I'm nowhere near the level of MJMP.

Yeah, if something else is FUBAR, maybe those transistors won't get fried. My question is; which two run channel B? I would only have to change two instead of four parts.

I guess that's another reason to change one part, and then check

Rather than start a new thread, I'm reviving this one.

Where to start...Focusrite + Windows = Headache.

It seems like the Focusrite constantly wants to disconnect itself from the desktop as far as the DAW is concerned. I don't know it it's Cubase, or Windows, or just the stupid Dell Desktop I have.

So, I'm looking into replacing ALL of it!

Starting with the PC. I've been looking at a Macbook Pro to start with. A bit pricey at $2500 USD, but I imagine it will be better for networking and maybe even the DAW. I may try the Focusrite in that before I commit to a Presonus. I'd like to salvage what I have before spending all that cash on completely rebuilding the entire set up.

Has anyone here with a Mac tried any of the Focusrite hardware, and if so, can you offer any suggestions/advice?

I'm just sick of trying to record tracks and it looks like I'm doing it, but the end result has no sound.

Now if we could only figure out the cause and fix it, that would be great!

Ok time to revise this old thread. I finally bought a USB <> MIDI connector, connected to a MP-2 and tried out the program.  While the back end work is great the interface is cludgy because of the rotary knobs and only one way to change them i.e. swipe up down with mouse while clicking left button.  So I started looking into how to change the UI.  The UI is in WPF (now deprecated) and the code is C# using .NET.  So far a friend has been able to change the knob widget to a slider but we haven't worked out the communication with C# yet, so you can't (it seems) just swap them.  I also want to add scroll wheel support and direct edit of the value(s) and pick lists or radio buttons for things like voice selection.   Also I want to move the program selection to top left corner (seems a more usable place for it) and get rid of the 2 screens showing the hex program values, while I'm sure they are interesting, they don't add value when programming a patch (that I can see) and take up quite a bit of screen real estate. 

I have a longer wish list like being able to do RTM assignments, but getting the UI easier to use while auditioning the patch is my immediate focus.  It would be good to leverage of all the DSP/VST stuff as some of those plug ins have really good UIs (e.g. the MP-1 plug in) but I suspect that would mean re-engineering the C# into C/C++.  But then maybe it can be cross platform. As Valdiorn said, he used the tools he had and was very familiar with.  Unfortunately, they are now quite dated/deprecated  (e.g. WPF) and .NET dependant. My friend helping with this said you need an older version of visual studio for the C# .NET stuff.

So we are working on it (in our/his spare time).

@valdiron, are you still around ?