Sontec eq

Sightings of Burgess ‘Mr Sontec’ Macneal are rare, and interviews even rarer. So lovers of fine audio design settle back, pour yourself a glass of something short and smooth… and enjoy. Sprinkled in between the big names of the audio industry at last year’s AES trade conference were countless boutique manufacturers offering everything from ‘better than original’ U47 replicas to 500-series rack module EQs. There were even re-issues of esoteric ’70s keyboards replete with their associated snarls of patch cords… all who saw were amazed! There was also a Mellotron on show, but no-one responsible for it wanted to tell you who made the tapes… oh no, that was far too big a secret to divulge… national security would have been compromised.Amongst this fever pitch of ‘re-issued classics’ was an impressive white EQ ‘replicating’ the now almost legendary, nay mythical, Sontec equaliser. Now the Sontec was the stereo EQ that started our whole love affair with fully-parametric equalisation back in the early ’70s, and replicating it seemed mildly scandalous, I thought. Having said that, if it was any good I could imagine it might prove quite popular provided it didn’t cost anything like the sums of money that currently change hands when a Sontec comes up for sale. But surely a faithful reissue would be impossible to make, regardless. The construction of an original Sontec EQ is a marvellous thing; dialling in an EQ setting on one of these babies is like cracking a safe. After nuclear war the three things left standing will surely be my old Studer, the Sontec EQ and Uluru. Anyone who owns an original (and there are a small handful of lucky individuals in Australia who do) swears by them. They’re like the EQ equivalent of a Neve BCM10 – at parties, to say you own a Sontec is to immediately draw a crowd… or clear the room, I’m not sure which.On the so-called ‘Sontec’ stand was an old gentleman who appeared to know a thing or two about it, and as I wandered past he was busily showing some eager customers the various control knobs and switches. They seemed impressed. But I kept walking; I’d seen enough replicas for one day and my feet were killing me. So I wandered around the corner and sat down on Joe Malone’s stand for a breather. No sooner had I alighted on his couch than Joe was at me: “You’ve just gotta go over to the ITI stand and meet Burgess Macneal, He’s a total legend.”“Who?” I responded.“Burgess Macneal… Mr Sontec!” said Joe, looking both excited and stunned that I didn’t know the name.“Really, I just assumed the EQ I just saw was a re-issued copy.”“No, no, this is the real deal!”So, with renewed enthusiasm, I went back over to Burgess’s stand, introduced myself and asked him if he might like to have a chat about the history of Sontec, and the bona fides of the ‘replica’ now turned ‘new original’ sitting in front of me.“Why sure,

2022 at 03:26 AM.. Gear Addict Joined: Jul 2010 🎧 10 years Quote: Originally Posted by MakeBelieve ➡️ We actually copied the nomenclature down to the T, thats how it is on the hardware. Now, this kind of attention to detail I like! ) Make Believe Studios Joined: Aug 2021 Posts: 658 Quote: Originally Posted by OberHeim-Kenobi ➡️ Wow!! Really solid mid range equalizer , very smooth sound!!!. i have spent more time trying it, but i have to say it's really good.Pd how do i unlink the channels? You can right click the sontec logo and click unlink! Gear Maniac Joined: May 2012 Posts: 265 🎧 10 years Don't get stucked up, choose one of the 1000x more alternatives for Windows than there is for Mac. Lives for gear Joined: Dec 2012 🎧 10 years Quote: Originally Posted by Jantex ➡️ Wow, amazing. I am surprised, I always picked them apart, bit was 100% that it is just the other way around, because this is the type of sheen that Sontec makes so effortlessly. But anyway, if I was making my eq decision, I would strive more to sound like A. And on the other hand, Crave Eq has been my favorite EQ for a few years now ������ Man , you praised this sontec version as a phenomenal one of a kind breakthrough of the decade in the plugin world , but u picked Crave in blind A/B , however , back in a Noiseash thread , you bashed the hell out of their neve version as being nowhere close to where it suppose to be or being even remotely close to a hardware behaviorWords spoken with utmost confidence...Yet, u picked the Noiseash file as ur favorite in a blind shootout that included an actual hardware unit too...Dude , i just don't get u Peace Lives for gear Joined: Dec 2007 Posts: 2,797 🎧 15 years Quote: Originally Posted by Digital Crush ➡️ Man , you praised this sontec version as a phenomenal one of a kind breakthrough of the decade in the plugin world , but u picked Crave in blind A/B , however , back in a Noiseash thread , you bashed the hell out of their neve version as being nowhere close to where it suppose to be or being even remotely close to a hardware behaviorWords spoken with utmost confidence...Yet, u picked the Noiseash file as ur favorite in a blind shootout that included an actual hardware unit too...Dude , i just don't get u Peace You obviously do not understand. One thing is listening to the clips produced by others and totally another thing to actually use the tool and see how quick and how close you can arrive to your desired result. Saying I prefer someones clip A to B, doesn’t mean that one EQ is better. It just means that in my opinion he did a better job with tool A. If I used both tools I would prefer the tool

Is still exhibiting his wares at the AES (as is George Massenburg). From what little I knew, Sontec hadn’t existed as a company for decades and Burgess Macneal was almost mythical in his elusiveness – the pro audio equivalent of the Loch Ness Monster. So what does the Sontec EQ consist of nowadays… and I had to ask him where he’d been hiding all these years.BM: Well, I’ve always been here. And as for the Mastering Equaliser, it’s the same… well no… I’m half lying. Here’s the deal: The unit was originally designed to be semi modular. When the ITI unit was first built they were using a military connector. So when we did our first Sontec, we built exactly the same board, the same size, with the same connectors in the same locations, so we could just drop it in. That way people with ITI boards, could drop in Sontec boards and get back to operating again.These first Sontec boards are to a large extent very similar to the present ones, except for the tuning amplifiers. At that time we were using an IC, and it was the best IC available, but it was a long time ago – we made those boards up to around 1987. At that point I went into a complete redesign. Originally they were called MEP 250A, 250B, 250C and they were all – internally and structurally – very different to this. I went back and redesigned the thing to go into a discrete amplifier at the tuning stage. Which did two things: 1: it made it quieter in the EQ mode, and; 2: it gave it about 6dB more headroom in the equalisation circuits, which most people don’t notice unless they push the originals really hard. With the new amplifier I found by changing two resistors it became a lot more ‘crash’ resistant. That’s been the major change.AS: What do you mean by ‘crash’?BM: If you push an amplifier too hard, it clips. And unlike tubes, transistors clip hard and you’ve got all kinds of garbage coming out. So by moving the clipping level up 6dB, it became a lot harder to push the equaliser into overload when EQing. There have been minor changes in components too. The earlier modules were ‘potted’, whereas the later versions – from 1988 onwards – have little plug-in boards, no potting, and they work fine.AS: So the switching on these new ones is all ‘original’?BM: The switches that ITI used, and the people that made them, went out of production long ago. We subsequently found a good substitute, after a long time searching, and we used them for about eight years. But then I grew unhappy with them after reports of noise and people having to clean them started filtering in. I inquired about repairs with the supply company, only to discover that they’d been bought by somebody bigger, and they, in turn, by somebody bigger still. From there someone had decided that these were military grade

AB tests produce is another indicator. If it were that obvious, everyone would chime and find it easy. When they don't, there is your answer. Actions speak louder than words, as they say.Regardless, take *anything* you read with a pinch of salt, as humans are wired to see/hear with bias. I remember reading a post here from a very well respected/experienced engineer about printing through converters, stating nuanced differences between two high end units. Turns out the uploader made a mistake and it was the same file. Cognitive bias gets the better of us all Lives for gear Joined: Dec 2007 Posts: 2,797 🎧 15 years As mentioned by @b0se above, I love Crave EQ and use it regularly as well as my main EQ. I still think this Sontec is something new in terms of EQ and accurate modelling. It makes me really work fast and come to the results I want quicker than anything else I own. And as much praise as I give to Sontec, I am disappointed on the other hand by plugin such as GoodMath which I have stated clearly here. Lives for gear Joined: May 2017 🎧 5 years Quote: Originally Posted by mastervargas ➡️ isn't that the truth? If I had a dime for every "gamechanger", "amazing", "awesome", "hands down best ever" statements here on gearslutz I'd be rich. But the rule is simple, the ones we're still talking about (and using!) years after they were released are the real deal, and they are not many, the rest is fluff. Amen! Gear Head Joined: Nov 2013 🎧 10 years Currently road testing the Sontec.Not sure what the magic is in this plugin as it's very clean in PD.It seems to sound better than other Mastering plugins I put it up against(Curve Bender,Spl PQ,etc).I'm not matching settings just using each one to get a desired sound but there's always something extra with the Sontec.Especially in the low mids where it seems to tighten things up beautifully.Top end is smooth but the 1k to 3k range brings clarity without harshness.The one thing it needs and should be a priority is some form of autogain. I demoed the Sontec. It's good, maybe a bit better than the IK one and probably better than the Acustica one (don't have it).But I can't see how this is a "game changer" "next generation of modelers" or anything like that. Lives for gear Joined: Dec 2007 Posts: 2,797 🎧 15 years It is very clean, but definitely not totally, and not overemphasized saturation like in majority of emulation plugins. Gear Addict Joined: Jul 2010 🎧 10 years Quote: Originally Posted by Caet ➡️ But I can't see how this is a "game changer" "next generation of modelers" or anything like that. What is a "game changer" after all? nothing is, IMO.Even the real Sontec in the hands of a moron is worthless. Make Believe Studios Joined: Aug 2021 Posts: 658 Quote: Originally Posted by mastervargas ➡️ What is a "game

News that we just sold two ITI consoles! The president then says, ‘I’ll call the engineering guys and call you right back.’ 20 minutes later he calls back and says, ‘the engineering guys don’t want to build consoles’…BODY BLOWBM: Well, as far as George and I were concerned, that was pretty much the death blow. Soon after that incident George and the salesman both left the company. The salesman, at least, saw the writing on the wall – ‘if you can’t give me products to sell, why am I here?’ Eventually I left ITI as well.By this time ITI was getting into all kinds of financial difficulties. Then one day, the bank decided to shut the place down. The company sat in the building for months and months while the bank figured out how to sell it, and finally in January of 1975 – in a driving snowstorm – they had an auction. At the auction, George Massenburg – with Earth, Wind & Fire’s backing – bought the entire big studio, a company in Nashville bought the mastering lab – if you want to call it that – and I bought the pressing plant. Moral of the story: if you save your pennies you eventually get stuck with record presses! Looking back on it, I often wonder to myself, what was I thinking!When the auction was over, they’d sold a lot of miscellaneous stuff. They’d sold resistors, capacitors and all the hardware. ‘But what happened to the equalisers?’. I looked around, and there, under a tarpaulin on the floor, was all the engineering, drawings, front panels, and chassis – all kinds of stuff. I said to the auctioneer, ‘How much for this pile of junk?’. He said, ‘give me $75’. So I did, and consequently became the owner of ITI. That was a really exciting day. George was like, “you actually bought it?”“I actually bought it,” I said. “… for 75 bucks!” We could have written a book entitled; ‘Three hundred ways not to build an equaliser’.. THE $75 COMPANYBM: We quickly found new premises for the pressing plant gear, moved the important stuff into our very, very small house, and started to make the Sontec equalisers in the front room, with my wife doing the assembly and yours truly procuring parts. We eventually re-hired many of ITI’s good people, and went back into manufacturing. I went out and started selling the mastering equaliser, which at that stage nobody had ever really used before. Sterling Sound bought the first one, which is still there in use I think. After that, people started saying, ‘they’re using it at Sterling… we need one’.AS: So what made the Sontec EQ so popular; what gave it its character?BM: Well, good question. Remember the Sontec was designed as a mastering EQ – for cutting vinyl. A cutting lathe needs to be able to control what’s known as the ‘preview’ channel, because it’s 6/10ths of a revolution of an LP ahead of the ‘cutting’ channel. The

Quote: Originally Posted by Karloff70 ➡️ What, the entire bundIe? That's amazing! Am about to swap my Iio-8 2D for a 3D one and Iooking forward to these goodies a Iot!!! Yep, the whole heap o' good math. Gear Addict Joined: Oct 2022 Posts: 385 Quote: Originally Posted by MakeBelieve ➡️ We actually copied the nomenclature down to the T, thats how it is on the hardware. My bad, didn't realize that it was also like this on the hardware. Apologies. Make Believe Studios Joined: Aug 2021 Posts: 658 Quote: Originally Posted by loji ➡️ the MH Sontec is very very good... does the same tricks as the real hardware.I've been lucky enough to own or use about 6x different 430/432 series Sontecs over the years Scarlet is poor (IMO) technically there is ripple in the response at 44.1, making it not match the hardware. It's only close running at 96k. . . it might sound good subjectively on some program material , but it's not what a Sontec sounds like. . . plus its bugs, chirps, and CPU consumption issuesIK is better, the curves match the hardware correctly, but the hardware sounds more open. IK sounds a bit cleaner than the hardware in my experience .. which can sometimes be a benefit. the MH Sontec (IMO) nails what the hardware does ... I don't like the sound with everything set flat, and the tone can change in non intuitive ways .. ie: flip the low shelf from 50 to 100, you get a different tone even set at 0dB. (same trick gets used on the hardware to make choruses sound Bigger, etc...) There is a reason that this version is the only one Burgess himself has ever collaborated or approved. hi Loji can we use this in a quote thank you. Lives for gear Joined: Feb 2005 Posts: 1,967 🎧 20 years Tricks ? Maybe some presets would be fun for people Unfamiliar with this beast of an eq and what tricks it has up its sleeve. Lives for gear Joined: Mar 2018 🎧 5 years Quote: Originally Posted by MakeBelieve ➡️ Check your emails! Its christmas! You crazy freaks! Yes you, MakeBelieve and Metric Halo!❤️ Make Believe Studios Joined: Aug 2021 Posts: 658 Quote: Originally Posted by shahstlz ➡️ You crazy freaks! Yes you, MakeBelieve and Metric Halo!❤️ I am stoked to hear that you’re loving em! Gear Head Joined: May 2022 Posts: 60 Got back to the US and setup some projects through the MiO console -using the new limiter on parallel channels, Sontec here and there, etc - sounds amazing. Becoming less and less enamored with plugins over time, but can see these getting use for years, much like CS3. Gear Maniac Joined: Jul 2005 🎧 15 years Wow!! Really solid mid range equalizer , very smooth sound!!!. i must to spent more time trying it, but i have to say it's really good.Pd how do i unlink the channels? Last edited by OberHeim-Kenobi; 3rd November