Just wanted to let others know who are thinking about buying either the original or B version of the NOS McOne.

It is not reliable and has several issues.


I've had 2 now. First I got the original one which was un-balanced and plagued with grounding issues. Then I got the B revision which is balanced but came with its own set of problems.

First of all the image drift is horrible at lower levels. Which I understand is a downside of a passive design. Another problem is when the output pot is all the way down there will still be some signal coming through. According to the manufacturer and dealer this is all "normal". Hm.. THIS IS A MONITOR CONTROLLER. These issues should be clearly stated before someone pays money to buy this.

I lived with those problems, and ignored em. Ok no big deal. But now after about 6 months a new issue came about. When switching through different sets of speakers there is now a loud pop and when muted speaker set B still passes a bit of signal to the right side.


Moral of the story is when it comes to monitoring. Spend the extra $$$ and get something that is reliable and has great sound quality.


I'm gonna buy an Avocet and get it over with.


Stay away from New Old Sound!

Strange, a friend of mine has had one since they came out - it works fine..

Mine works perfectly and has been one of my favorite studio additions going between my RME 802 and Focal Solo 6 bes... Literally an awesome volume controller and the mono switch is great for verifying EQ moves. If you are having issues with the unit maybe contact the manufacturer. If you are having trouble with your mixes it is not the MC One.

I love the unit but it has flaws (At least the ones I've had do). When your volume is all the way down, do you notice sound still passing through? How is the stereo imaging on yours? Mine completely goes sideways at lower levels.

Happy customer here! No issues.

Hi, I have McOne active , no issues, it woks perfectly.

I used it again last night at a buddy's studio after a neve board - worked fine..

If you still hear a faint bit of audio at zero (I didn't), you can flick
the mute switch. Buying an Avocet would be very expensive in the
current musical income climate but hey go for it if you wanna..

I would but now when I hit the mute switch, audio is still passing through. I checked everything. Waiting on CS from NOS and ZenPro to let me know how to proceed.

It's a passive design so I can probably even fix it myself.

The legendary NwAvGuy wrote a lot about this, see here for instance:

Channel Balance – All pots have some channel balance error. Due to the logarithmic nature of perceived volume, and the way voltage dividers work, the channel balance error will be greatest at the lowest volume settings.

NwAvGuy: July 2011

This is, as you say, almost unavoidable in passive designs.

/Magnus

With a properly designed controller the difference in the volume levels should be less than .5 dB IF the builder uses good quality pots. My Benchmark DAC-1 tracks within that spec. If you need perfect tracking then go for stepped pots with .5% precision resistors and hand tweak as needed or use the system the Avocet uses. (110% satisfied Avocet user)

FWIW

I bought a McONE a few years ago and it was pretty cool. It did have an issue with my Dynaudio 6As and would hum. I knew about the low level stereo problem as they had it listed on their website. I did eventually sell it and bought a Dangerous Music ST. At the price point of the McONE there was nothing else that came close for monitoring in a passive controller.

Hi.
Would it be safe to say that the McOne is quite ok if not used on low levels? If I ex. use it mainly as a switch between sources and amps, but mainly use the amp for volume adjustments?

I have a great pre amp for most of my speakers anyway, and the volume knob on that one is within comfy reach. I just want an easier switch between speakers. Mybe easier with a simple switch panel?

as long as you don't get any hum like I did. On my passive monitors there was no hum. What really sucked was the Dyns at the time were my main mixing monitor. The low level issue was strange but not terrible.

I got this passive monitor controller for our video studio and it worked well Palmer MONICON Passive Monitor Controller PMONICON B&H Photo

FWIW (no speaker selector switch BUT it did track well and went all the way to cut off) We got Dynaudio speakers and I purchased their controller so I sold the Palmer on Ebay.

Feels like this is more a unsubstantiated post than anything. Also a bit damanging towards NOS as a company trying to sell their volume controllers. Maybe it would be worth considering to remove this thread?

^^ literally his only post