Fireface 800 - Clipping converters

[IzzyRock]

Is it worth trying clipping my FF800 converters (getting 2mix loudness)
Any good? Or dont even think about if if I ant got Aurora or Prism

[mikymike]

Originally Posted by IzzyRock

Is it worth trying clipping my FF800 converters (getting 2mix loudness)
Any good? Or dont even think about if if I ant got Aurora or Prism

Yes, it is worth it, especially if you are going for that awesome rme converter clipping effect!!!!

[vibralux]

Why would You like to clip a coverter? I mean any converter ? It's no valve compressor

m

[feyshay]

Don't clip your converters. If you want to get louder, use a plug-in or hardware limiter.

[IzzyRock]

Most guys instead of using a plugin clipper go and clip the converters

(I learned that here :D)

[IzzyRock]

I think this should have been moved to "mastering". my bad
any moderator??

thanks

[Ciozzi]

I don't think it's really worth it... at least as much as clipping your digital master buss. Digital clipping always sounds clicky and cheap to my ears.

The only converters that I've tried and sound good for "clipping" are apogee's. I mix OTB and bounce to the hard disk through a rosetta 800 with the soft limit engaged. It's an analog, tape like limiter and tend to sound crunchy if pushed (you can clearly hear the harmonic distortion) but still retaining the dynamics and the tone.

If you want something cleaner, transparent to make your mixes louder then the Pendulum PL2 is great for the purpose, but not exactly cheap.

Nothing that I've tried so far in the digital domain comes even closer to these two units.

I almost forgot, aphex makes a compressor/leveller/limiter called compellor 320A/D. I never tried it but owning other aphex's equipment I guess it's definitely worth a try!

[thermos]

Originally Posted by feyshay

Don't clip your converters. If you want to get louder, use a plug-in or hardware limiter.

Funny, every ME I know and like clips good converters before they even lay a finger on a limiter. Joe Gastwirt hardly ever uses a Limiter, and uses clipping to be competitive.

Anyhoo, don't know how the FF800 will do 'till you try it. My guess is you could probably get an extra db or so given the specs, but it may crap out shortly thereafter. I use the Auroras, which I can clip to the point of being satisfied.

[IzzyRock]

Do you use a PAD to get the impedance lower? If not u may force the souncard's outputs and get distortion

[HockeyMike]

Originally Posted by thermos

Funny, every ME I know and like clips good converters before they even lay a finger on a limiter. Joe Gastwirt hardly ever uses a Limiter, and uses clipping to be competitive.

I could probably find a lot more that would never think of clipping their converters. What's supposed to be the advantage of converter clipping vs. limiting?

(And I'm pretty sure Gastwirt ain't using no FF800...)

[IzzyRock]

Originally Posted by HockeyMike

I could probably find a lot more that would never think of clipping their converters. What's supposed to be the advantage of converter clipping vs. limiting?

(And I'm pretty sure Gastwirt ain't using no FF800...)

Mostly for ROCK music, when limiting you are changin your balance btw the mix.. when clipping, your balance doest not change and your drums doesnt lose punch.

However, the better clipping happens when your mix has a good frecuency balance (lets say, u dont have 6 db+ at 60 hz and 10 db at 5 hz :) )

Just try to put a L2 on your mix and see how all the transients go away

[IzzyRock]

Whether you like or not to clip your converters, its not the subject of this post.
For that matter, go and moan here Clipping your converters.


I need to know if other RME or FF800 users have tried that on their converters and impressions.


Thanks

[thermos]

Originally Posted by HockeyMike

I could probably find a lot more that would never think of clipping their converters. What's supposed to be the advantage of converter clipping vs. limiting?

(And I'm pretty sure Gastwirt ain't using no FF800...)

I really doubt you could. The advantage of clipping a good converter vs limiting is that it just sounds better/more transparent most of the time. Try getting like 4-5db of gain reduction via an L2 sometime, and then that much with a top of the line converter.

And yes, Joe Gastwirt certainly ain't using a FF800 (Pacific Microsonics model 2). But I do it all the time with my Lynx Aurora, and it works beautifully.

[Ciozzi]

Originally Posted by IzzyRock

Mostly for ROCK music, when limiting you are changin your balance btw the mix.. when clipping, your balance doest not change and your drums doesnt lose punch.

However, the better clipping happens when your mix has a good frecuency balance (lets say, u dont have 6 db+ at 60 hz and 10 db at 5 hz :) )

Just try to put a L2 on your mix and see how all the transients go away

The L2 doesn't do just limiting, it's much more complex. Clipping your converters means cutting the top the waveform which is exactly what brick wall limiters do. There are plugins that do this job at stupid prices (even 50-60 $) like the voxengo elephant and sound smoother that just clipping your AD. Don't assume that overloading you converter is the only way to go