The Sound Signature of limiters

[ORC]

L3 is just awful in my opinion. The 3 I like best are Voxengo's Elephant, PSP Xenon, and Fab filter pro-L. I use whichever of these 3 sounds best for the given track,

[Slug1]

Ozone is really nice. A bit bright but really nice. The Xenon is absolutely wonderful and imparts to me the most lovely analog character of most of the limiters out there. It seems to add a console conditioning smoothness. Now that won't work for everything. But when that's what you're looking for, its the king. I think all of these plugin limiters sound awful when pushed too much. The big labs put a Weiss DS1 digital limiter in the chain. Its beast. My workflow is to add loudness through analog compression and a nice clean preamp going into my A/D with enough heat but without clipping. Then I put a limiter on the input of my DAW so that I don't clip in the digital domain and push up there. I like the Flux for that. Then final level is done using Ozone. It works for me most of the time.

[toolskid]

You should really try some limiting with Dynamic Spectrum Mapper from ProAudioDsp

Its really amazingly good

[Tarekith]

Originally Posted by ORC

L3 is just awful in my opinion. The 3 I like best are Voxengo's Elephant, PSP Xenon, and Fab filter pro-L. I use whichever of these 3 sounds best for the given track,

Exactly my thoughts.

[Silvertone]

Originally Posted by Alécio Costa

Hi,

I have been doing some careful tests lately with a bunch of limiters.

L3 Ultra seems to provide a bit more loudness than TC Brickwall Limiter II, Mc DSP ML4000 and PSP Xenon.

However, I feel that it makes some serious damage to frequencies over 6kHz.

Has anyone else noticed that?

I have tested different parameters, etc but the mix sounds unbalanced.

I have not tested the Ozone Limiting section carefully yet .

PSP Xenon sounds warm, TC BW II slightly high-middish.

Any opinions?
Thanks

So does the L2... the only way I avoid it is to use the Weiss DS-1 Mk3 as my final limiter set to -0.3 on the output and take the L2 out of the chain all together. Now when I need a little high end lift I sometimes use the L2 in the chain... sometime I even use in place of EQ (when it works for the track).

Just putting an L2 in line changes the sound, heaven forbid if I ever have to use more than a dB or two of limiting with the unit!

[Laurend]

I dislike all Waves limiters.
I've created a little test to understand what makes every limiter so special.
If you're interested in testing your limiters using this method, here are the links to the original audio file and the prob waveform.
Here's the test comparing 4 limiters. Fab filter pro-L, Ozone 5, Slate Digital, mine.
4 Gain Reduction Strategies - YouTube

[Jerry Tubb]

Originally Posted by Alécio Costa

PSP Xenon sounds warm

Hi Alécio,

and the "Predict" buttons (B or C) in the Transient section can affect that warmth.

Normally I use C, but if mixes come in really bright I might use B instead.

Quite happy with PSP Xenon, I use it in soundBlade HD daily, usually for only 1-2dB of limiting. As a result, I've not even tried the others you mentioned.

Haven't fired up the L2 in a few years now, don't miss its "signature" sound!

Best Regards, JT

[thermos]

You really should try Ozone 5. All of the limiter algorithms sound different and are useful. Waves L3 is actually a multiband limiter, so it doesn't really count to me. It can actually sound ok with a db or 2, but will still change the mix. After a few dbs it sounds like something is broken.

Ozone 5 is definitely my favorite limiter I've tried.

[Neodym]

wait,isnt limiter like a limiter? except these that copy analog units

[teebaum]

i use voxengo elephant3, fab filter & ozone5, waves l3 is strange

[pmx]

i find the md4 and pro-q to sound the most clean, if i need some grunge i grab the l2007. if you don't do any heavy lifting, there's not a lot of sound involved imho. at least not more than there are other trade-off's to consider at that moment.

[sat159p1]

Haven't found any info about Tone Boosters Barricade here.. I'm using it for all-round stuff and it works great for me. Who's enjoying it too?

[Alécio Costa]

Hi, Jerry!

Xenon is really my favorite Limiter. It is the daily workhorse, along with BW II from the TC MD3 Suite.

I bought Ozone 5 but I have not had enough time to play with it.

That interface is so cluttered that makes me dizzy.

Thanks for the info, folks!

[thehightenor]

If your goal is transparent limiting in the 2dB GR zone and you want to leave your transients perfectly intact especially the kick then nothing, but nothing to my ears, beats the TC Brickwall limiter.

If you goal is max loudness, I can't help as I've never gone there with a limiter.

tht

[JP__]

Originally Posted by sat159p1

Haven't found any info about Tone Boosters Barricade here.. I'm using it for all-round stuff and it works great for me. Who's enjoying it too?

Me!
Use it with slow settings for some "pushing up" followed by the Flux Elixir with fast settings for concrete brickwall. The elixir never ever produces overs and is very transparent with fast settings and decent GR.

[mmarra]

Ever since demoing the Pro-L it has been my go to limiter. It is very flexible and easy to change the parameters to get the sound you need. Also the presets are actually pretty good......a good starting point to tweak further. I usually never use the factory presets on plugins but the Pro-L really has some good ones

[Thomas W. Bethe]

Originally Posted by mmarra

Ever since demoing the Pro-L it has been my go to limiter. It is very flexible and easy to change the parameters to get the sound you need. Also the presets are actually pretty good......a good starting point to tweak further. I usually never use the factory presets on plugins but the Pro-L really has some good ones

for the Pro-L and Xenon both are GREAT!

[Sotsirc]

Originally Posted by Silvertone

So does the L2... the only way I avoid it is to use the Weiss DS-1 Mk3 as my final limiter set to -0.3 on the output and take the L2 out of the chain all together. Now when I need a little high end lift I sometimes use the L2 in the chain... sometime I even use in place of EQ (when it works for the track).

Just putting an L2 in line changes the sound, heaven forbid if I ever have to use more than a dB or two of limiting with the unit!

Are you talking about the hardware L2?

[teebaum]

Originally Posted by Sotsirc

Are you talking about the hardware L2?

the hardware l2 is the worst hardware i ever bought.
the switches drop out, the potis start to get insane after weeks (i had 3 units, all had the same problems) and the a/d & d/a are crap.
the algorithm sound the same like the plugin l2 - compared to elephant, fabfilter etc dreadful.
if behringer had produce only once a unit like this the would been
bashed for years in every forum.

[Sailor Hope]

Originally Posted by JP__

Me!
Use it with slow settings for some "pushing up" followed by the Flux Elixir with fast settings for concrete brickwall. The elixir never ever produces overs and is very transparent with fast settings and decent GR.

I have been considering getting Flux Elixir, but I recently discovered Barricade, and that made me wonder wether I needed to invest in Elixir. Right now my listening conditions are not so good. What listening conditions do you have ? And what is your opinion on the difference between the two ?

L

[lu432]

Alécio you really need to check out the Pro - L its really my favorite Limiter. I only use that or the PSP Xeon, everything else is just weak and meek in comparison. And I have listened and compared all of the aforementioned limiters. I would love to see what your results would be of the PSP and the Pro-L. I personally find the Pro-L more transparent but harder hitting, and the PSP Warmer. Depending on what I am working on I will go to one or the other.

[JP__]

Best you can do, is simply demo both of them by your own. I don´t know your approaches of work nor with what style of music you work.

Elixir is very clean and transparent with fast settings and small GR. It also produces no overs. What it dislikes is to crush all the dynamics...
Barricade I like better with slower settings and it takes more GR on modern styles of music. It has a somewhat saturation-style of sound.

For acoustical music I often only use elixir.