I start to notice too much the noise floor of the Analog Heat. I even consider parting with it… -80dB with Clean boost with drive at 2 O’Clock (my default “sound better” setting) is what I observe.
I have it as an insert on my Xone 96 and everything I track goes trough these. I have to remember to turn the AH off, and to record at hot levels, else I end up with too much noise.
I’m welcoming some noise. Too much not so much (subjective of course)
I wonder two things:
Others perspectives about the topic?
How about alternatives with regards to “make sound good” compressors/slight distortion? For a use with the equivalent of soft AH settings, how is completion regarding noise floor?
Edit: to take the Xone96 out of the equation, I just looked at it using Overbridge. I get -83dB noise with clean boost and drive at 2 O’clock.
My perspective = you cant hear a noise floor of -80db in the full mix peaking at 0db with say -12db RMS. So if you slam a mix to have bugger all dynamic range, you definitely cant hear it. Noise is good. I like noise.
I record every take with it on, so each sound adds that noise
And in combination I record my signal rather quiet because that’s what fits the song.
So, if using the AH only on say the master, or a few recorded takes recorded hot, no problem.
If late evening and I forget to take it out and record too quiet, problem
It limits my use of it, and makes me a bit nervous. I’ve been bitten for the last tracks I made. In the end I managed to tame the noise but it was beyond the “I like noise” level…
I LOVE noise and wouldn’t want a dead clean signel. My Xone 96 already adds some nice analog SSSHHH…
I think even the newest SSL mixers have higher noise floor than what you mentioned here. But as you said, noise adds up pretty quick. When i started tracking through my Ghost mixer i needed to relearn all the tricks that all people used to do back in the day. Like trim all clips and tracks recorded. Or add noise gates to every channel. That stopped the noise from being too loud on the quieter parts of a track.
And gainstaging gets more important as every little bit of noise gets added for each track.
Another issue is if you try to “master” the track as it will often push the quieter and silent parts up in volume so the noise gets distracting.
No. Just the length. It might not be relevant to your workflow. But i multitrack my synths to different tracks in cubase. And before i was lazy and just used the full length recording of each track. But cutting out all the “silence” on each track makes a big difference.
Noise floor at -80dBFS is actually really good, I’d think.
Of course it depends on the type of music and if your arrangement is very busy or if it has multiple very quiet sections - but for electronic music it’s usually not much of a problem.
If you want, you could run a test by driving the noise floor up until you have a very audible constant hissing sound, hit record in your daw, let it record a few seconds of the hissing before and after the test recording.
You can probably just do a quick fade in/fade out to get rid of the noise before/after the mix, noise won’t be audible in the mix at all.
Imo “vibe/enhancement saturation” like the AH offers is better on busses/groups than every single individual sound, try that maybe? I don’t really know if the AH is really meant to be a tracking sweetener like a really nice preamp or something, I use it more like a character box personally. Push it hard as an intrinsic part of one sound, or enhance busses/full tracks. That’s just how I use it though, ymmv
That’s what I’m exploring indeed. I track stuff through the Xone96, and use its EQ and filters at will, which I like the result of.
With an H90 on sends when needed (also learned to refrain from too much delay/reverb, which sounds great but once burned in and I regret the amount or length I’m done for).
My new plan is to use the AH for tracking only for special effect and not just as a sweetener, and then use it as a sweetener indeed either on busses or the master, sometimes.
I use it as a sweetener on the Xone master when jamming, it’s pleasant!
Sounds like an excellent workflow, right now it’s glued to my OT’s main outs in my living room but when it’s hooked up to my computer, that’s its main duty for me as well. It’s a surprisingly versatile box when you play into its strengths!
