MIX magazine Review Nov 2013, Additional content for "Three Mastering EQs"

By Tim Dolbear - www.timdolbear.com

Hey all,

My review for the November issue of Mix, "Three Mastering EQ Plugins", had a lot of extra info I wanted to add, but we did not have room.  I wanted to talk about what "sound" is added to you audio when you simply load one of these EQs before you even turn a knob.  They are doing something to your sound, so let's dive in!

So…whats going on behind the GUI face plate …

Since the Pultecs, Millenia and Waves RS-56 EQs all tout the full modeling of the hardware counterpart’s analog circuitry; I wanted to share what I was hearing by simply inserting these plug-ins onto a track and not twisting any knobs.  What’s being added?  Harmonic distortion, noise, extra EQ curve… Since just placing these onto a track changes the sound before you even start moving a knob, its good to know what signature they bring to the signal.

I did this a few ways, first by simply placing a song on 2 adjacent tracks in Sequoia. I then muted the 2^nd track which contained the plug-in.  Now I can simply hit the Solo button on the muted track to hear this 2^nd track, allowing me to switch between them seamlessly and instantly to listen for added tones and distortions.  Secondly, with both tracks playing, I flipped the phase button on the mixer to cancel out the entire shared signal and only hear the difference, showing the added EQ curve and distortions that the plug-in was adding.

The Pultec EQP-1A with EQ switched out but the plug-in on, added some low mids warmth. With the EQ switched in, but with the EQ set flat, there is also a nice sheen added to the sound, slightly more highend and even more low mids. But this is not just a frequency boost, but more of a transformer type sparkle or excitement, Hi-fi-esc.

The Pultec MEQ-5 adds a bit of the same sheen as the EQP-1 had with its EQ switched in.  But, I do not hear any difference between having the EQ switched in or out on the MEQ-5.

The Pultec HLF-3C with the low cut and High cut set to off, There is no difference to the sound compared to the unprocessed signal since there is no in/out circuit to be modeled. The original HLF-3C does not contain an amplifier or other circuitry outside of the passive EQ cut filters.

The Millennia in Class A Discrete J-Fet delivers a light Hi-Fi sheen to the sound, but it’s very very subtle. In Class-A Vacuum Tube mode, an additional, very subtle silky high end enhancement, you also get a slight bump to the low mids, but again, very subtle. 

With the WAVES eq set flat, there is a slight boost to the highs but not a lot of added tone from modeling of tubes and transformers, like you find with the UA Pultec collection. Something entire different was going on. The thing I heard, and easily confirmed through running the null test, there is actually some very fast, tube like compression taking place to the transients. 

:-)