Brian Kehew « GREAT on almost anything. Sonically pure. »
Published on 03/20/26 at 17:30
Best value:
Excellent
Audience:
Anyone
I own a Quad Eight Pacifica console - and there are 2 of these included with it. They are great on almost anything - a very natural sound, even when pushing hard. I know they use a DBX gain element for compression, but the makeup gain is the super-sounding AM10 from Quad Eight - together I think it's a strong combo. Besides compression, they do Expansion/Gating, which is quite useful for me.
I find it not to be a "hard" compressor (like DBX) it has a soft edge and makes things FAT and SMOOTH, especially when you have an unruly sound with spiky midrange etc - it tames it right down, but without the squashed sound.
Mine have been modded with the factory settings for De-Essing - this is a super option. Only a few were sold like this, but it's SO useful, especially as the range goes well down into the midrange too. See below for documentation of this mod...
I find it not to be a "hard" compressor (like DBX) it has a soft edge and makes things FAT and SMOOTH, especially when you have an unruly sound with spiky midrange etc - it tames it right down, but without the squashed sound.
Mine have been modded with the factory settings for De-Essing - this is a super option. Only a few were sold like this, but it's SO useful, especially as the range goes well down into the midrange too. See below for documentation of this mod...
