Sound Performance Lab 2383 manual Operation, Setting levels on the GainStation

Operation

In spite of its quality and flexibility, the GainStation 8‘s trans- parent user interface allows quick, intuitive operation. The unit is suited for a wide variety of applications. The following sections will provide an overview of the most important opera- tional concepts and several application examples.

Setting levels on the GainStation 8

Start with the limiter switched off. With a representative signal present at either the MIC or HI-Z input, set the desired combi- nation of Clean and Tube Gain so that the 9 dB LED illuminates brightly. When this LED illuminates weakly, you have 9 dB of gain. When brightly lit, you have 15-17 dB, which still leaves you with a good 9 dB of headroom (in the range displayed by the orange 18 dB LED) before clipping. The orange LED illumi- nates dimly at 18 dB and brightly at around 26 dB. The red Clip LED should never illuminate—this indicates clipping in the clean stage, which generally should be avoided, as it will lead to distortion of the solid-state circuitry. (You may find this desir- able in some rare cases—we had lots of fun creating heavily distorted guitar sounds…)

The Clip LED does not display high amplification levels in the tube stage that could lead to distortion. The GainStation 8 inten- tionally allows tube saturation, since tube distortion—contrary to transistor distortion—is often a desirable effect.

Once you have adjusted the gain levels as described above, use the Output Level control to set the optimal output level for subsequent devices in the chain.

IMPORTANT NOTE: The Output Level control should not be set above 0 dB when working with high internal levels of more than 18 dBu. Otherwise, extremely high output voltages of up to 34 dBu (approximately 38 Veff) can occur, which can damage other equipment. Please refer to the documentation of your other equipment regarding maximum input levels.

16 GainStation 8