Heavy-hitter DI shootout! Also, my best Recto tone yet!

[Metaltastic]

Alright, here we go! The results are...

A - Countryman Type 85
B - Little Labs Redeye
C - Radial J48

As I expected, the passive pickup was more sensitive to the impedance differences, which is why my favorites went in order from highest to lowest input impedance (Countryman, Radial, Redeye), but I feel the differences were really minute. And with the EMG, as I said, I really cannot distinguish between the Countryman and the Redeye, and found the J48 to be unpleasantly thin sounding. FYI, the Countryman has by far the highest input impedance, followed by the J48, and then the Redeye (cuz it's passive). Either way, IMO the J48 is a fucking ripoff, cuz it's more expensive than the Countryman and to me doesn't sound as good!

And I updated the first post with a link to the DI's, btw.

 

[MetalJonesy]

aye if i was getting a more expensive DI the countryman would have been my first choice anyway!! nice to know, cheers for this post Marcus!!

 

[Jaymz]

I prefered the Red Eye with the Dimebucker, id take either the Red Eye or the Countryman for the EMG clips aswell so the Red Eye would seem the best for the price.

 

[Ermz]

...but for some reason I think I'm jealous of you RedEye et al owners on a very subconscious level

~006

Heheh, don't be. I'll likely be selling mine in light of the comparison on this thread. I hate muddiness and low-mids, and the Red Eye has consistently had the most of both here.

The only unit that really stands out from the rest is the countryman, because it seems to retain more of the higher, edgier frequencies and as such sounds more open and hi-fi.

Once again cheers Marcus for this test. It's always fantastic to have stuff run up side by side in a blind shoot-out. I stick with my first impressions in saying that for actives the differences are minimal, for passives a bit more audible, and that B was consistently my least favourite sounding of the bunch :Smug:

 

[Metaltastic]

Well hold off until I do the re-amp shootout before you sell your Redeye, Ermz It'll be the Cuniberti Reamp, Redeye, ProRMP, and X-amp - all the options under $200!

 

[Unavailable]

Ok, this time, listening on my monitors, I didn't hear any major differences except in A on the dimebucker.

 

[spioraid]

I did noticed some difference with the Radial, but if the Radial was the only one I owned and absolutely needed a DI box I'd still use it.

The RedEye and the Countryman sounded almost the same, but every once in a while there was a slight difference. But that's with my head up against the monitors going..."uhhhh.....YEAH I TOTALLY HEARD A DIFFERENCE....OR NOT..."

And yes, the 85 made things kinda muddy and made my multimedia speakers bleed in the low end.

Ugh...what a horrible description to get a mental picture of. I'm sorry.

 

[brandy]

glad to hear that they are all working good!

i think the differences in sound are more a matter of performance than the boxes themself.


thx for the test.

Yea - that's what I am thinking as well - at least it is difficult for a real-good comparison when you are not judging the same take...

Mh, I don't know how a shootout using the same take could be done.

A take could be recorded via a good DI Box and then it could be reamped directly into the various DI boxes... But that involves the sound of the first DI box as well as of the reamping box. But if that is a constant factor... Mh. But how does this interact when for example the same DI box is used for the test later...? So the clean track passes the same DI twice?

High End Converter would be not bad as well here...

But beside those thoughts - thanks a lot for the shootout!!

Brandy

 

[brandy]

Oh - what I already did some years ago:

I recorded a guitar via a decent setup - some mics together with a DI track... Later I reamped the stuff via the exact same setup/settings - I set up the output of the x-amp exactly to match the output of the guitar (I connected the x-amps out first to the DI box and matched levels till the phase inverted input 100% canceled out the existing track - this is possible but you have to compensate converters latency first).

After I reamped some riffs I was able to 100% A/B the differences from "recorded straight " <--> "reamped".

 

[Soundlurker]

The only unit that really stands out from the rest is the countryman, because it seems to retain more of the higher, edgier frequencies and as such sounds more open and hi-fi.

Once again cheers Marcus for this test. It's always fantastic to have stuff run up side by side in a blind shoot-out. I stick with my first impressions in saying that for actives the differences are minimal, for passives a bit more audible, and that B was consistently my least favourite sounding of the bunch :Smug:

+1 on everything.

The redeye is far from being unacceptable, imo, but it comes last.
Listening to the duncan DIs right now, the countryman is very noticeably better. On the EMG ones it's just slightly better, the redeye is slightly worse and the radial is inbetween.

 

[AdamWathan]

Marcus, when you do the Reamp shootout, throw one of the DIs hooked up backwards into the mix...

 

[Metaltastic]

Ooh, good idea Adam - too bad I sold 'em both!

 

[AdamWathan]

Ooh, good idea Adam - too bad I sold 'em both!

Not bothering to really think this through before I post but you could run the Redeye in DI mode backwards couldn't you? Not sure if this is worthy of bothering with though since the signal probably still goes through the transformer and would effectively be the same as reamping anyways, I dunno

 

[Ermz]

+1 on everything.

The redeye is far from being unacceptable, imo, but it comes last.
Listening to the duncan DIs right now, the countryman is very noticeably better. On the EMG ones it's just slightly better, the redeye is slightly worse and the radial is inbetween.

If only the test was done before I bought the damned thing! Really hoping it fares better as a reamp unit... I suppose versatility is one thing it has on its side, though with my luck I wouldn't be surprised if the Countryman in reverse as a reamp still sounded better

Was the Red Eye the only passive unit in the shoot-out?

 

[Metaltastic]

Yup, Countryman and Radial are both active, which is what gives them their higher input impedances (though the Radial isn't even 500kohms if I'm not mistaken - honestly, I really did not like it for either application :Smug: )

 

[Metaltastic]

Not bothering to really think this through before I post but you could run the Redeye in DI mode backwards couldn't you? Not sure if this is worthy of bothering with though since the signal probably still goes through the transformer and would effectively be the same as reamping anyways, I dunno

Haha, yeah, I'm gonna guess that'd be exactly the same as using it in re-amp mode - props for thinking outside the box though!

 

[Jaymz]

Is a higher impedance better for passives or...? Im fucking clueless on this shite haha

 

[Metaltastic]

Tut tut, someone didn't read the "Preparing Your Tracks for Reamping" thread It's all explained there, but in short, yeah, the higher the input impedance of something (DI, preamp, etc.), the more tone is preserved, especially high end/clarity. However, the difference is minimized with lower impedance signals, such as those produced by active pickups (because the signal is buffered by the internal preamp), but with passives it's more important.

 

[Jaymz]

Your perception is impeccable sir You give me a quicker answer anyway.

 

[Melodeath]

If only the test was done before I bought the damned thing! Really hoping it fares better as a reamp unit... I suppose versatility is one thing it has on its side, though with my luck I wouldn't be surprised if the Countryman in reverse as a reamp still sounded better

Was the Red Eye the only passive unit in the shoot-out?

Well you can't run a Countryman in reverse, as it's active.

Is a higher impedance better for passives or...? Im fucking clueless on this shite haha

A higher impedance will "measure" the tone more and affect it less. And I believe passive pups have higher output impedance than active pups, thus higher impedance (usually found in active DIs) would "matter more" for passive pups. However, I'm not sure if having a huge impedance might actually affect the performance of the pickup, as I have heard an amps impedance interacts with the pickups.

Anyway, I just did the shootout. Oh and I randomized the order of the clips in my DAW to make sure the test was truly blind. Ignoring the fact that I already knew what A, B, and C were, I didn't know which I was listening to.

For passives, order of preference was A, B, C. "A" sounded the most alive, the brightest (which could be bad, but can be compensated for with EQ on amp), and the clearest. B was almost as good, and C sounded muddy and dull IN COMPARISON (probably doesn't sound muddy and dull if you just listen to it by itself).
Looks like that's Countryman, Redeye, Radial.

For the EMGs, my preferences were C, A, B. C was slightly more "alive" than A. B sounded like it has a blanket on top of it, and a bit muddier IN COMPARISON).
Look's like Radial, Countryman, Redeye

Also, I think playing performance may have influenced my perceptions a bit. it's hard to know if the minute tone differences I heard were the DI or the playing.