I posted a question awile back (November i think) and i did some testing. its regarding whether to use a tube or solid state preamp with a DI to record guitars with and reamp later. I dont have any clips though, sorry, but one thing was clear, the solid state won out over the tubes. the tubes sounded too warm and was soft on the transients. i record metal, EMG 81 and Ernie Ball Petrucci Model guitar.
solid state vs tube preamp for DI
- Thread starter steveguitarplayer
- Start date
bryan_kilco
Member
shredder10
Replace that #@#|@#â!!
tempe
Captain Midnight
That could be true for guitar, but try a tube preamp on bass DI one day, you'll enjoy it I promise 
tempe
Captain Midnight
amarshism
Member
recently i sent guitars for reamping to cj and he commented on the 'soft' sound of the DI, which was an avalon 737... maybe i should have used a solid state unit?
BLUElightCory
Member
That could be true for guitar, but try a tube preamp on bass DI one day, you'll enjoy it I promise
SO true. The A-Designs REDDI is the most monstrous sounding bass DI on the planet.
Uros
Sonic Incision
Well, it's kinda logical if you think about it. The solid state amp is more transparent by a fair degree comparing to the tube one, which introduces much more color, making it 'warmer' (a characteristic which a lot of us tend to like), but it also saturates transients, rounding them off. On the other hand the solid state amp doesn't do that (or if it does, at least it's much less noticeable), which leaves transients sharper. So, there you go.
DigitalMetal
Building a Mini SSL
When comparing solid state you should also differentiate between transformer input and discrete opamp inputs as they are both considered as solid state as far as i know but have very different charateristics.
Most of the more desirable/expensive/vintage DI/Pre's use transformers which drive with a pleasing colouration where as cheaper DI boxes/pre's use discrete opamps and sound very clean / transparent but when you drive them too hard they sound like ass!
I think this is very important to highlight in this discussion.
Most of the more desirable/expensive/vintage DI/Pre's use transformers which drive with a pleasing colouration where as cheaper DI boxes/pre's use discrete opamps and sound very clean / transparent but when you drive them too hard they sound like ass!
I think this is very important to highlight in this discussion.
