Behringer clone Neve

[GreenKnee]

https://www.behringer.com/product.html? ... e=0838-AAW


It's funny, at practice on Wednesday I was chatting and said why haven't Warm Audio or Behringer cloned the 1073? And then the very next day these were announced.

I've always wanted a 1073 for home (have one in the studio) and so I'll be waiting eagerly for the initial reviews. My new years resolution is to record a 45 minute epic on my own, and so this would be good for me to get some tracking done at home with the beautiful piano my Mrs bought last year.

Specs look good enough to me, if I do get one then I'm able to A/B with the real deal which would be cool to do.

[Dok]

just a note to say that Warm Audio did clone the 1073, back in 2018. https://warmaudio.com/history/

Looking forward to the reviews on the Nevinger, though!

[marqueemoon]

It’s a pretty hard to touch price point. I wouldn’t trust it though.

DIYRE just announced their 500 series 1073 module which I’m more excited about. The AML stuff also looks really good.

Other than a high pass filter the benefits of hardware eq are kind of lost on me. I don’t like to track with eq, and I don’t want the expense and complexity of setting up a hybrid system.

[øøøøøøø]

After the transformers, the biggest expense on any 1073 copy will be the concentric rotary switches (they’re probably a bigger cost barrier even than the EQ inductors)

They’re not commonly-used parts so economies of scale historically hasn’t really worked for inexpensive clones (it’s also why you see so many “preamp-only” variations)

This is changing somewhat now that demand for Neve-like objects has approached “universal”

Most of the rest is “parts is parts” passives and semiconductors

Some people swear based on “listening tests” that different transistor slight-variations can impact performance meaningfully but I remain substantially unconvinced, particularly when operated within the linear region (before hard clipping, i.e. 99% of the time, at least for me)

The transformers and signal-path tantalum capacitors are by far the biggest contributors to the sonic signature of old Neve, for better or (occasionally) worse

Most of the reproductions (on both the high and low end) use the same Carnhill reproduction transformers, so as much as it’s not fun or exciting I’d suspect the cheap knock-offs to sound substantially similar to the high end ones.

For reliability/longevity there might be a case for the pricier options

[stevejamsecono]

Most of the reproductions (on both the high and low end) use the same Carnhill reproduction transformers, so as much as it’s not fun or exciting I’d suspect the cheap knock-offs to sound substantially similar to the high end ones.

For reliability/longevity there might be a case for the pricier options

I'm watching this with some interest for this reason. Less because I want one myself and more because I used to work with one of the brands responsible for the high-end versions and they took the hand-wired stuff pretty seriously. Not to say the human craft of it isn't impressive but I do truly wonder how much that matters to the working engineer.

[Dok]

After the transformers, the biggest expense on any 1073 copy will be the concentric rotary switches (they’re probably a bigger cost barrier even than the EQ inductors)

They’re not commonly-used parts so economies of scale historically hasn’t really worked for inexpensive clones (it’s also why you see so many “preamp-only” variations)

This is changing somewhat now that demand for Neve-like objects has approached “universal”

Most of the rest is “parts is parts” passives and semiconductors

Some people swear based on “listening tests” that different transistor slight-variations can impact performance meaningfully but I remain substantially unconvinced, particularly when operated within the linear region (before hard clipping, i.e. 99% of the time, at least for me)

The transformers and signal-path tantalum capacitors are by far the biggest contributors to the sonic signature of old Neve, for better or (occasionally) worse

Most of the reproductions (on both the high and low end) use the same Carnhill reproduction transformers, so as much as it’s not fun or exciting I’d suspect the cheap knock-offs to sound substantially similar to the high end ones.

Interestingly enough, the gain and frequency selectors seem to be swapped on these Behringer dual-concentric pots, which probably points to cost-savings being the rationale. I also read in one of the other threads that Behringer says that they created Midas transformers that match the specs of the Carnhills. We'll see!

[øøøøøøø]

Clicking through, it looks like the Behringer unit uses transformers from a different vendor and also the “1273” model designation is a clue that it may be “1272 w/ EQ” rather than a true 1073 copy

1073 has a third gain stage and is topologically more complex

[Dok]

Brad, do you know off the top of your head if any of the other clones, (a la Heritage and Warm) have that third gain stage? People seem to be excited about the upcoming 500-series DIYRE 1073 (without EQ) because of the third gain stage but that's not something I really remember people talking much about in the infinite, endless forum threads about Neve clones over the past several years. Seems like one always mostly hears about single input and output transformers.

[øøøøøøø]

The higher end ones—Heritage, AMS-Neve, BAE—all do

Most people probably don’t talk about it because it’s not an easily-understood or widely-known thing (until now?)

It also only matters at very high gain settings

I have a rack full of Seventh Circle N72s; they lack the third gain stage and sound fantastic

Nothing sounds quite like the vintage Neve consoles we have at our Brooklyn place—not even the high-end new clones

For that matter, some of those channels sound a bit different from each other, and the slightly-later 8058 with Belclere line transformers sounds ever so slightly different from the earlier 8088 with the St Ives

But the margins were talking about are all “not going to be noticeable by anyone in context”

You could probably secretly swap a BAE into input 9 or whatever on the desk and nobody would say anything