Vintech Audio 473

The Vintech Audio 473 is a four channel set of (Neve) 1073 style microphone preamplifiers. They're not 1073 clones exactly, but share the same make up of that you'd find on them, EQ and all. The connections it has are for both 1/4" and XLR inputs and outputs, as well as 1/4" inputs on the front panel for plugging directly in. It is a rack mountable piece of gear and will take up two rack spaces in a traditional casing.

UTILIZATION

Regardless of your experience with original Neve 1073 modules, the Vintech Audio 473 is pretty user friendly and there isn't much of a learning curve for this. Each of the four channels is the same, with what's basically a two band EQ, and switches for phantom power, phase, EQ in/out, and a button for selecting either a mic or line input. The two bands of equalization just each have two frequencies to choose from, while the preamp has both a line level and a output level for finer adjustments. Lastly, there's an impedance button to switch between input or output levels. I haven't seen a manual for this, nor do I think most users will need it.

SOUND QUALITY

The tone quality of the Vintech Audio 473 is definitely of a high standard. While perhaps not as smooth or warm sounding as a real Neve 1073, the price speaks for itself in comparison, as this will cost you nearly as much as one channel of the original will. These are overall really full sounding preamplifiers and are definitely great for a variety of purposes, although I've mostly just used one channel of it for recording vocals. Maybe it's not as good as a real 1073, but very few mic preamps are, and for this price this is definitely the closest you're going to come.

OVERALL OPINION

The Vintech Audio 473 is the perfect addition to any studio looking to get four high quality preamplifiers at a great price. In terms of price per preamp, it really doesn't get much better than this in terms of quality of the preamps. It's also great to have the EQ on here as it's easy to use and can add a lot to your sound when needed. I'd say that something like this is perfect in a smaller home studio or producer's suite where you might only need no more than four preamps at a time anyway. No matter where you're using it however, the 473 is a great deal!