-= Safe Sound Audio =-

Reviews

Excerpts from the Oct 2008 Sound On Sound Magazine Review of the Dynamics Toolbox, review by Paul White.

'As an audio processor, the Dynamics Toolbox turns out to be extremely versatile and can certainly be used to lay on a considerable amount of gain reduction without obtrusive side-effects. In Dynamic [tracking] mode, the unit takes on the role of bus compressor very effectively, gently knitting together parts of the mix, but with the added advantage of the Blend control and side-chain EQ for 'bottom up' processing or indirect tonal tweaking. At modest settings this processor adds the required density without killing the high end or introducing audible pumping, but when I brought the threshold right down and turned the ratio right up, I was easily able to get it to kickback in a way that was musically very useful.

I also achieved some dramatic results when using the Dynamic mode to beef up a sampled drum kit, where getting the compressor to the edge of pumping added a lot of excitement and attitude to the sound. Similar benefits were audible on some bass-guitar tracks.

Peakride really is a powerful compression mode, and I found it particularly useful for evening out the level of vocals that were recorded with excessive performance dynamics. Used conventionally, this will often be enough to get around the problem, but for singers who have a habit of really dropping their level on some phrases, the Blend mode will also be useful, as you can leave the peak level more or less where they are and bring up the low-level material underneath.

Wrapping all this up, it seems that the Dynamics Toolbox is very aptly named: it's certainly flexible enough to meet most compression requirements, from tracking to buss compression to mastering, yet it is also as easy to use as any standard compressor. It can control dynamics in a subtle and transparent way, but it's able to stamp its sonic identity on a signal with the authority of an overweight yeti sporting lead diving-boots. In short, this is a truly professional compressor and well worth checking out.'

Excerpts from the May 2008 Audio Media Magazine Review, review by Simon Tillbrook.

'The design of the Dynamics Toolbox may be complex but this does not get in the way of making it easy to operate. Straight out of the box you can be up and running very quickly achieving good results, but do spend time understanding the differences in the modes. The benefits of the Dynamic Toolbox will then make a lot more sense.

With Peakride on both instruments, and in particular vocals, the Dynamics Toolbox tracks extremely well, applying just enough processing in a smooth and virtually indistinguishable way - very musical indeed ... the Dynamics Toolbox dealt with all manner of intensive transient information faultlessly through all the examples I tried.

Dynamic Tracking gives you all the flexibility to bring out some real aggressive character. When used with the blend control for that 'New York' style of adding in aggressive compression to dry signal, the rock meter goes all the way to eleven. Great to have all this control in the box with such a simple functional control.

Easy to use, but so powerful when you learn what the Dynamics Toolbox is really about. Capable of producing results that are smooth and musical, to hard, aggressive, and in-your-face, you are never disappointed and will continue to find reasons to widen that smile'

Excerpts from the March/April 2008 TapeOp Magazine Review, review by Andy Hong.

'As with the P1, the Dynamics Toolbox's Peakride compression is unbelievably smooth on vocals. Even with slower attack times and high compression ratios, sibilance was never a problem as it is with lesser compressors - a tribute to Peakride's ability to track and compress a signal without distorting the waveform, and this contributes greatly to the unit's transparency. The compressed vocal never sounded pinched, nor was it flattened so much that the emotion (in the natural dynamics of the performance) became indiscernible. With Peakride's multiple sidechains, the release time and the compression ratio are automatically adjusted to follow the signal in a musical and organic way. With lesser compressors, too fast of a release time can distort vowels, and too slow of a release will overly clamp syllables that follow big vocal transients.

On vocals, I also found the limiter to be surprisingly usable for controlling sudden consonants (and some plosives) with very little scooping of the vocal (what you hear when a limiter recovers from a big hit). It was the first time that I was able to use an analog limiter on vocals in this manner successfully.

On drum submixes, in Dynamic Tracking mode, I could set attack and release times for a squashed, pumping sound, which I could then blend with the uncompressed signal to get a nice, driving beat. Or using auto-release, I had no problem getting a subtly-thickened drum submix with very little evidence of compression. For this kind of task, the sidechain EQ is crucial in preventing the kick drum from punching holes in the mix.

...I have purchased a Dynamics Toolbox (with Lundahl transformers) for myself. I'm loving it for tracking and mixing, and it's definitely the most flexible compressor in my arsenal. This do-it-all compressor/limiter warrants a serious look, especially if you're a DAW user, not only because of its wide range of capability during all stages of recording, mixing, and even mastering, but also because its Blend feature is crucial for implementing parallel compression without an analog mixer (or two sets of converters) to circumvent latency issues.'

Bob Katz shares his first impressions of the "Dynamics Toolbox"

Bob Katz is a world renowned recording and mastering engineer located in Florida USA, and founder of Digital Domain which provides mixing & mastering services for records produced around the globe. Bob's wife (and partner) Mary Kent provides full graphic design and replication services there as well. His book "Mastering Audio: The Art and the Science" is a must read for audio engineers, and he has written numerous articles for major trade magazines. His record credits are a testimony to his passion for mastering and improving the process at every step of the way. His patented processes are in use around the world in better mastering rooms.

Even though the Dynamics Toolbox wasn't designed primarily as a mastering compressor we were very interested in Bob's opinions about how the unit matched up to his very exacting standards;

Bob Katz:

"So, here we go. Tomorrow I'm mastering a very high quality jazz ensemble that was recorded and mixed in a relatively purist manner, so that's what I put through the Dynamics Toolbox. Probably better to see whether it can pass the transparency test first.

First thing I did was patch it into a very transparent D/A/D chain with the latest Cranesong HEDD converters, source is at 96 kHz, then D/A, then A/D into my digital chain and monitor. After setting the output controls to unity gain, I found the sonics of the Dynamics Toolbox to be VERY transparent without compression, even with the Lundahl transformers. I felt that the electronic output sounds less clear, a hair less "transparent" than the Lundahls in this environment. Very subtly. This is puzzling, of course, since less is usually more, but perhaps you are driving the Lundahls from a different active stage and perhaps I hear the slight loss of transparency of the active driver stage. But it is extremely subtle and I had to match gains by ear very carefully. Let's see if others hear the same difference. So, let's say tentatively I prefer the transformer output, marginally.

I LOVE the blend control. On this nearly-audiophile production, I was able to get an extremely subtle effect, just the sort of "fattening without losing transients and impact" that I was looking for. But in addition, the continuous ratio that goes all the way down to 1:1 is an innovative feature, because even with the blend OFF (or fully wet) I was able to find a very low ratio setting (probably less than 1.5:1) which can be extremely subtle (desirable in mastering).

It was nice to arrive to a setting with this music, which was too dynamic a source, where the OUTPUT SOUNDS BETTER THAN THE INPUT! That's the sign of a good compressor. The Dynamics Toolbox sweetened and fattened the sound without adding any objectionable distortion of its own. It is possible to warm up the sound subtly and to arrive at a subtle result with ratio near unity and blend set to full wet or OFF.

The sidechain eq works VERY nicely and this is a BIG plus. I was able to use the high pass filter to keep the acoustic bass from driving the compressor too hard. I would not have been able to achieve the sound I wanted without the sidechain EQ.

Now I have to read the manual. (Oh, you passed the test that the box was operable without the manual. Though there are some features I have not figured out without the manual ("peak ride") but I'll check 'em out tonight from the book in bed, wife cooperating :-).

I got a chance to test the Safe Sound [Dynamics Toolbox] on a rock and roll mastering that I completed yesterday. Yes, it rocks!"

Bob is currently submitting his thoughts to us for a mastering version of the Dynamics Toolbox and he's already given us some great suggestions on control panel layout and labeling which we'll incorporate into a dedicated mastering version some time in the future.

But back to the present! The current model was designed as a do-all compressor / limiter for tracking ("Peakride" mode) to submixing and final mix glue ("Dynamics Tracking" mode) and even project studio mastering situations but to have found it to excel in hi-end mastering situations at least on a sonic level gives us confidence that the Dynamics Toolbox has a great future.

Excerpts from the summer 2006 TapeOp Magazine Review, review by Andy Hong.

'The unit is built exceptionally well with high-quality components, and there's a real power supply inside... The compressor really shines on vocals. Even with ratios greater than 4:1, I was able to smooth out some fairly dynamic vocal tracks without any hint of overcompression or unnatural "pinching" in the upper mids. I've never been a fan of the RNC, mostly because everything I send to it sounds smaller, even when it's supposedly compressing 'transparently'. On the other hand, the P1 seems to fulfill on its promise of transparent compression. Whether I sent it syllables sung staccato or layered oohs and ahhs, post-compression levels were solid, and the vocals sounded up front even when the compressor was clamping down to -15 dB. Also, any initial transients in the vocal that made it past slower attack settings didn't sound overly sibilant-another reason why the P1 sounds so transparent...'

'Dang if the P1 is't the easiest to use Bass DI and recording chain out there. Unless you hit the limiter, which adds a bit of distortion to the attack (which could be a good thing if you're looking for an agressive, picked sound), it's pretty hard to screw up the sound of a bass with this thing. In fact, I was able to dial in some of the best DI'ed bass sounds with the P1 that I've ever gotten... The P1 also seems to excel at capturing acoustic guitar, an instrument that I consider to be one of the hardest tests on a recording chain... The expander also worked well on a guitar track with a noisy amp. And on vocals, it was easy to set up the expander so it decayed naturally even on quiet syllables. No matter what instrument I threw at the expander, I never got it to chatter... a great-sounding, do-it-all recording strip that's super easy to use. Give the P1 a shot. You can't lose.'

Extract from the P1 Review in the September 2005 edition of 'Recording Magazine' by Paul Stamler

'Darned good. Very, very clean, with no hint of harshness, and I see the word "beautiful" is in my listening notes... the P1 is clean, clean, clean... I tried some a capella choral music... through the P1; it kept the power and the punch while managing her wide dynamic range very nicely. I also tried it on other vocals, including the long, drawn-out notes of the eerie "Been in the Storm So Long," and it handled the music with aplomb. Likewise some narration voice-overs sitting in the computer from a few months ago. My conclusion: This compressor really likes vocals.'

Check out the full review in the September 2005 'Recording Magazine'

Review of the P1 in the 11 Sept 04 edition of UK 'The Radio Magazine' by Andy Bantock

'It's not big but it is clever'

'From the point of view of the user, Nirvana lies in the highest quality, lowest price item of equipment. This, of course, is a difficult thing to achieve as everyone down the chain from component manufacturer to the person that delivers it has to make a living. This is the reason why the likes of Behringer do so well; they build everything in China and cut down their costs considerably. Even Soundcraft now make some of their equipment in the Far East'

'So you can imagine my joy when I came across the P1 from Safe Sound Audio. The P1 is an all analogue compressor/limiter with a built-in headphone monitoring section which is reasonably priced (£350 plus £10 for the optional rackmount) and, more importantly MADE IN BRITAIN!'

'The front end has a low noise microphone amplifier with 70dB of gain, a high impedance instrument input and a balanced line input which all share a single gain knob. There is a simple expander section and a compressor of which Safe Sound are rightfully proud. It's extremely smooth in operation with fully adjustable threshold, ratio and attack. The limiter section is touted as "the most sophisticated 100% analogue limiter on sale today" which is a fairly bold claim but it does sound very nice and it features true 'look ahead' limiting which allows potential overloads to be caught before they occur. The output is balanced output with the capability of driving up to +21dBu.'

'The monitoring section is one of the most interesting features from the point of the radio user as its addition to this unit makes it an ideal front end for an ISDN contribution system. The P1's monitoring section allows a personal mix between output and an external input. In ISDN terms the external input would be the clean feed send from the other end.'

'The P1 is certainly a very nice piece of equipment. I wasn't able to give it a really thorough test but my initial listening experiments with an audio-technica ATM61HE dynamic mic and then a Behringer B1 large diaphragm condenser mic listening on a pair of Beyerdynamic DT250 headphones proved very successful'

'The P1 (pictured below) is available directly from Safe Sound Audio in the UK on 07866 574522 or www.safesoundaudio.com.'

Review of the P1 in the June/July 2004 edition of the UK broadcast magazine LINE UP by Gerry Fursden

'The P1 Audio Processor is certainly very easy to configure and use, and sounds acceptable almost regardless of settings - such is the sophistication of its dynamic control side chains. With all the dynamics processing bypassed (except the output limiter), the input stage sounded neutral and pretty transparent with a low noise floor. The output stage was able to drive substantial peak levels without difficulty and showed no signs of stress driving +18dBu into my Apogee A-D converters, for example.'

'The compressor is a subtle and transparent design, levelling signals in an unobtrusive and musically flattering way, without making them dull or lifeless. I couldn't find anything to catch the compressor out - it always coped in an effortless way and without drawing attention to itself. The expander is intended to help clean up a signal by pushing unwanted background noise or spill further down in the absence of the masking source. Its attack time is fast enough to open cleanly without damaging the transients or adding a click, and the release time automatically matches the envelope of the audio signal so that the expansion is, once again, subtle and unobtrusive. The fixed 20dB range is enough to provide useful noise reduction without killing the background noise completely, which often sounds very false.'

'The limiter is just as unobtrusive and subtle as everything else - deliberately crashing signal into the end stops resulted in no drama at all - it's actually quite hard to hear the limiter working and only the flash of the red LED gives the game away! This limiter must rate among the best analogue designs you are ever likely to hear...'

'If you require a bomb proof but high quality preamp with built-in dynamic control, you really need to hear this!'

The full review can be found on page 30 of the June/July 2004 edition of LINE UP magazine.

Please note that the price quoted in LINE UP magazine is incorrect. Check the order page for correct pricing.

Review of the P1 by Matthew Sigmon of Sigmon Anderson Studios in the USA.

'There's salvation in simplicity with the Safe Sound P1'

'Over the last decade, technology has been extremely kind to music-makers. Serious project and home studios are viable realities today thanks to amazing advancements in digital recording that have essentially leveled the technical playing field between "enthusiasts" and "pros." While things like "tape hiss" and "wow and flutter" are now problems of the past, a new perilous territory for consumer-level recordists has emerged: the affordable, front-end creation of pro-quality sound to put into your PC or hard disk recorder.'

'Enter the Safe Sound P1.'

'The P1 is a brilliant single channel mic preamp with integrated expander, "peakride" compressor, and dynamic threshold control (dtc) limiter that sets a genuinely new standard for performance vs. cost in the front end unit field. The quality and features packed into this deceptively humble looking, half-rack space unit are quite unlike anything I've seen, and with a street price of $599 USD, the P1 may well be on its way to legend.'

'Don't let the P1's simplistic appearance fool you. As it turns out, simplicity is at the core of the unit's strength. The Safe Sound folks have mercifully spent their design and research time determining what operating characteristics provide for the most natural capture of audio sources of any dynamic range. They then attempted to build these "tendencies" into a circuit design that doesn't just indiscriminately treat your audio, but actually makes decisions about the source material and responds differently depending on what you're sending it. The end result is full, organically dynamic recordings that have depth and transparency, along with that warm, analog character that is the Holy Grail so many digital boxes and plug-ins claim to posses.'

'Safe Sound has a "white paper" posted on their site (read it here) that explains in technical detail what I'm describing in essence, and it's definitely worth a read, as it's this design philosophy that is at the root of the P1's uniqueness.'

'The rear panel is at once compact and comprehensive, with all of the connections you'll want. There are balanced mic and line level inputs as well as an unbalanced instrument jack. There is also the clever inclusion of inputs for both balanced and unbalanced monitoring of your stereo mix as you record.'

'At first the front panel of the P1 seems to lack a few controls you may be accustomed to seeing, like a discreet knob for the expander attack time, or compressor release time. But Safe Sound has designed these and other responses into the unit, with their ensemble "behavior" being the defining characteristic of this unique piece of gear.'

'The small but solid front panel starts with controls for input gain, +48V phantom power and an 80Hz hi pass filter. Next is a single knob and pushbutton on/off switch for the expander, followed by the three adjustable compressor parameters; ratio, attack and threshold. The compressor, too, can be switched in or out. Finally, the P1 includes a headphone monitor jack for those who are recording to disk without an additional mixer.'

'Conspicuously lacking are any user controls for the P1's dtc limiter, except for a front panel set screw! The limiter functions as an "always on" component in the P1, with a non-adjustable threshold. However, there is an output calibration procedure described in the manual that will allow you to set the unit up so digital clipping is also rendered a thing of the past.'

'The behavior of the limiter, again, is built into its circuit design, using triple control sidechains that Safe Sound claims allow it to anticipate and respond to audio peaks in a tremendously musical and natural way.'

'The apparent lack of user controls for the limiter, and to a lesser extent the expander and compressor, would seem to indicate a less functional unit, but in actual use, I found this design to be pure liberation. The P1 sounds great and responds musically because it is designed to. It's as simple as that. And the user controls that are available turned out to be the only ones necessary.'

'The P1 has received some tremendously favorable reviews already from producers and engineers with access to top-notch equipment. It's been compared very favorably with Neve and Manley units costing many times what the P1 does. But the reality for home studios is that many of us don't have a $3000 Manley stashed in the rack, so the comparisons are impressive but practically intangible. And besides, isn't road testing the P1 against gear that goes for six times its price kind of like running a Ford against a Ferrari?'

'To bring the evaluation home, so to speak, I chose to compare the P1 with a very typical, home studio front end piece that has received a lot of favorable attention: the Focusrite Platinum Trackmaster. Hovering near the same general price point I thought this duel would provide a more realistic gauge for those of us in the technically great unwashed!'

'I started out with the P1 and a Shure KSM32, and did some vocal work on a new track. I did a duplicate run using the Focusrite. The song has a dynamic vocal line, so on both units I used compression of about 4:1 ratio, with the hottest peaks resulting in 6 to10dB of gain reduction. The Focusrite has a three band EQ section while the P1 has no EQ at all, so I left the equalizer disengaged. In fact, the P1's lack of EQ was something I was sure I would miss, but we'll get to that in a moment!'

'Keep in mind, I appreciate the different characters that various pieces of gear can impart, and I don't have a particular "ideal" way that I think raw, recorded vocals should always sound. Anyone who has spent years working to coax professional results from low-cost gear has to develop creative tolerance for what's possible!'

'But in playback the difference was amazing, and far more pronounced than I had expected. The P1 had tremendously greater depth and dynamic realism, with the peaks and valleys retaining a smooth but solid presence. The Focusrite vocal sounded mid-heavy and opaque by comparison, lacking definition in both the high and low ends.'

'The P1's lack of equalization quickly became a non-issue, as it captured a breathy presence that was lacking altogether in the Focusrite track, and I found couldn't be smoothly duplicated with the Trackmaster's EQ section. The compressor in the P1 seemed to work more, but was far less evident in the track, and not remotely harsh. I'm not one to go head over heels for "invisible" sounding treatments, and I do like the sound of a compressor doing what itdoes. After reading some of the other P1 reviews, I thought I might miss that, but the unit is far from lacking in personality. My tendency to describe it as transparent comes from the fact that it can't be heard so much "on" the vocal, but rather "in" it, and leaves the impression that it obscures nothing of the performance, but only enhances it.'

'The limiter kept my levels in check, and I did get into it on the dynamic peaks, with the limiting effect remaining as smoothly musical as the compression did.'

'The expander, something the Trackmaster doesn't have, worked both simply and perfectly, and under normal conditions could easily be left on constantly while tracking.'

'I found that by pushing the P1 harder, it progressively displayed more color giving things a very analog character that could be great as a more obvious effect.'

'Sonically, the P1 stomped the Focusrite Trackmaster, clearly representing a different league of audio gear at a remarkably similar price.'

'So if you're thinking about buying a new front end piece for your home studio, and you've been pouring over the endless articles and ads that cover gear in the $500 to $600 range while your eye wistfully wanders over to the legends with the extra zeros in their price, you absolutely must do yourself a favor and check out the Safe Sound P1. It may be the first piece of gear you'll buy that sounds every bit as good as you hope it will.'

Extract from the new review of the P1 by Grammy nominated producer and engineer Bill Drescher

Bill Drescher is a Grammy nominated producer and engineer with credits from such diverse recording artists as Rick Springfield, Richard Marx, INXS, Bangles, Ringo Starr, Shawn Colvin, and Los Lobos. Bill recently had the chance to use a pair of P1's on a project. Here is what he had to say:

'I recently got to try a pair of P1s on a Christmas medley that I was producing for the Alien Cowboys, a rock instrumental band from the San Francisco area... We compared the P1s to Neve 1073s, which were rounted into a Neve 33609 stereo limiter/compressor. Obviously, with the USA price of the P1 being $599, there was quite a price difference between the P1 and the Neves.'

'In this comparison the P1 seemed to have a more 'in your face' presence than the Neve chain. The P1 also put across a sense of warmth similar to going to analog tape first... The compressor/limiter sounded great. It gave the performance a new energy while remaining transparent and not sounding overly effected.'

'The P1s had the same result on the drum mix... breathing more energy into not only the sound but the performance too. The P1 performed exceptionally well in all applications, and with so many features, is a great value for the money.'

'You can hear the Alien Cowboy's 'Xmasong' and the P1s as a free download at the Alien Cowboys website.'

'The Bottom Line: A buzzworthy recording channel that performs exceptionally well as a mic pre, compressor, expander and peak limiter.'

The full review can be found here at Mojopie.com

Extract from the review of the P1 in the December 2003 edition of Future Music by Steve Evans

In use: 'Plugging a condenser microphone into the P1 revealed a quiet and detailed sounding mic amp that more than stood-up sonically to the built-in amps that I have on my good quality 16 channel mixer.

I followed the set-up routine in the manual that calibrates the P1's "hard limited" output level to the desired input level of the destination soundcard. But as I was using a MOTU interface with variable input gains it didn't matter as much as it would if I had been using an Audiowerk8 card, for example. It's reassuring to know that whatever you are hearing is going to disk with no digital clipping, one less thing to keep an eye on.

Using a hand-held dynamic microphone gave a good opportunity to check the effectiveness of the hi-pass filter, which worked well and stopped the expander responding to the unwanted low frequency energy that is transmitted through the mic.

The expander gate works very well, yet quite robustly even at its lowest threshold. Initially I thought I may not be able to take the threshold down low enough, but the expansion doesn't give unpleasant side effects, even when it's working frequently - even in between words. Safe Sound recommend that you do not record with the expander in circuit, but it responds so sensitively that you may find that you forget you have it in. At the other end of the spectrum there is enough leeway to make the expander effective as an effect on playback - with gating toms for example.

Winding in the compressor gives you a taste of the P1's character - or lack of it even. What I mean is that the P1 compresses without sounding like it is compressing. You can obviously tell that loud singing is being recorded at the same level as quiet singing, but there is no pumping or sucking happening to the sound and the auto-release functions of the compressor adapt well to anything you care to throw in its general direction. Having said that, taking things to their extremes reveals a capability for some traditional compression effects that will certainly work many wonders for drum sounds and loops.'

Conclusion: 'Despite being an affordable, reliable and attractive prospect for hassle-free tracking, the P1 has teeth enough to be more than that. It has got a bite and crispness that would have you using it in mixes as well as for recording. The enormous input headroom and hard limiter make the P1 a great tool for "holding" all the elements in your mix without losing top-end detail and crispness, and its comprehensive range of connectivity options allows it to sit very happily in balanced signal paths if this is necessary.

I miss the inclusion of traditional gain make-up and release time controls, but Safe Sound have been clear in their intentions for the use of the P1, and provided a quick and intuitive input compressor that does what the manual says it does very well. I hope a stereo version will appear soon.'

Verdict: 'A fine sounding and intelligent analogue mono compressor/mic/instrument preamp designed to maximise your digital recordings'

The full review can be found on page 66 of the December 2003 edition of Future Music

Review of the P1 by David Young a recording engineer based in London

This comparison was made during a recent studio session in Berlin, recording the music for The Berliner Ensemble's theatre production of Shakespeare's 'The Tempest'.

'I recently had a chance to compare a Safe Sound Audio P1 with a Manley mono mic pre costing (and weighing) about six times as much as the P1. I had two brand new AKG 414s placed side by side about 20 inches in front of an acoustic guitar - a Martin D28 - with a good player. Each mic ran through one of the units, set flat, and on through Teac converters into a hard disc setup using Logic Audio.'

'In both cases the solo instrument sounded rich and detailed, with a blind test initially failing to tell the difference between the two units - both sounded great. A different kind of listening showed up differences between the units: I don't know the term (if there is one) for the aural equivalent of peripheral vision, but imagine kind of half listening to something while the conscious and analytical bit of your brain is otherwise occupied (say rooting around in a patchbay). Heard 'out of the corner of your ear' the Manley unit sounded a bit more upfront, or present, than the P1. Closer examination seemed to show that this was a slight lift at the top and bottom of the frequency response - a subtle 'BoomTsing' curve of the kind of the kind so often used by mastering engineers.'

'Listening to the guitar in the context of a track with other instruments - drums, bass, vocal - confirmed this: the Manley comes (slightly) pre-emphasised and pre-mixed while the P1 is more neutral. If I were recording classical music I would take the P1 any time; its even and unforced sound would 'last longer' and be less tiring than the more upfront Manley. For multitracked studio music it would be a matter of taste: do you want to print your sounds as they will appear later, or do you like to do all that stuff in the mix?'

'In fact the two devices were not all that different in terms of the expensiveness and quality of the sound. I prefer the flatness of the P1 (being a mixing kind of guy), and I most certainly like the idea of getting six of them for the price of a single Manley.'

'I'm not sure about those little rubber feet though...'

Review of the P1 in the October 2003 edition of Sound On Sound by Paul White - 'Safe As Houses'

Paul writes, 'During testing, the P1 Audio Processor lived up to its technical claims by being almost impossible to make sound bad! It's input stages are very clean and free of added colour, while the compressor evens out the levels in a very musical way without robbing the sound of life ... It sounds good in the same effortless way a nice tube mic does'

'Used anywhere close to sensibly, the limiter is effective and as transparent as any analogue limiter I've heard'

'I was impressed by the smoothness of the expander circuit ... It responded naturally to both guitar and voice, the release time seeming to 'mould' itself into the audio'

'It's good to see designers going back to first principles in an attempt to find ways to improve upon existing paradigms, and the P1 has certainly benefited from this approach. It's sound quality, both technically and subjectively, is way beyond what you'd expect from its modest appearance, and every stage works extremely well'

The full review can be found on page 164 of the October 2003 edition of Sound On Sound magazine or on-line here.