compressor reccomendation

[jimmy]

hi all

im looking at building a compressor when i work this bastard of a cmos chip out, and i was wondering what you had to say about them. im looking at the orange squeezer, flatline compressor, dod compressor, or the la light compressor.

suggestions/soundclips?

[jimmy]

anyone?

[Mark Hammer]

Do you want a recommendation for ease of build or a recommendation for suitability of application?

People have good fortune with the OS though many prefer the tone of a Dynacomp clone.  Optical stuff, overlooking its sonic advantages, can get tricky if you can't get precisely the components you want.

The Dynacomp/Ross clone at Tonepad works just fine.

[Gil]

OS is great sounding. sweet.

[jimmy]

orange squeezer it is then! ill let you know how it goes

[Gil]

OS was extensively used by Mark Knopfler on the first and second D.S albums if you was to know how it sounds. Sweet !  

[jimmy]

haha dire straits rule!! ill call it the mark-knopfler-in-a-box then  

[moosapotamus]

Any adventureous OS builders care to try this out for verification? :shock:
I haven't been able to find time to try it myself... yet.

http://www.moosapotamus.com/OS+++.gif

~ Charlie

[jimmy]

arrgh, i would try this one out, except ive already etched my pcb. unlucky. im sure someone will give it a go.

[brett]

NIce circuit that OS+++, but for simplicity, most of the benefits can be had by adding the attck and delay controls.  I might be wrong, but I doubt that full wave rectification will add much to the sound.  When playing well up the fretboard (e.g. soloing) most guitar signals seem to have short-lived negative and positive excursions, so I think that half wave would give similar results to full wave rectification.

Although I mostly use an OS, I'm surprised that more fans of the Dyna/Ross comproessor didn't come forward.  It is less subtle and smooth than the OS, but does offer some serious compression for those who play full-on rock-n-roll.  It's worth a look.

cheers.

[idlefaction]

it would definately need an output amp for recovery - the signal is taken post-compression, so increasing the gain would just increase the compression and i suspect it would actually make the signal quieter!

the most useful control here is probably the attack - for just that.  letting your attack through.  :-)  you could hack it into a normal OS easily by swapping the 1k5 and diode around and subbing a 2k pot for the resistor.

i bet these would sound cool on drums  

[moosapotamus]

The fullwave rectification in the OS+++ was offered by Rob Strand as a way to optimize the OS for Bass. So, might actually be quite cool for drums, too. I've been itching to try it for a while.

~ Charlie

[idlefaction]

hahaha i have 'transparent' compressors in my keyboard rack...  i think for putting over some of my old analog stuff tho something like this would kick ass.  i might build four of them and stick them in a rack box  

[moosapotamus]

hahaha i have 'transparent' compressors in my keyboard rack...  i think for putting over some of my old analog stuff tho something like this would kick ass.  i might build four of them and stick them in a rack box  

Right... :wink:

You know... You could, just as easily, make five and send me one. :mrgreen:

~ Charlie

[idlefaction]

lol we all are comfortable now with the fact that building a stompbox effect costs about $5...  plus $8 for pots and knobs...  plus $25 for jacks, switch and case  

so really the cost difference between building one and building four and putting it in the same box is pretty minimal, especially if it only has one or two pots!!!

and, i was going to build a patchbay anyway.  so why not have a 1U patchbay with four compressors built in?  

btw, if you pm me your address i'll send you an orange squeezer!  I DARE YA!!!

[bwanasonic]

lol we all are comfortable now with the fact that building a stompbox effect costs about $5...  plus $8 for pots and knobs...  plus $25 for jacks, switch and case  

Closely related to the $8 for parts, $8 for shipping phenomenon <cough>mouser</cough>.

Kerry M

[idlefaction]

heh i buy from jaycar, $0 postage

charlie, did you ever get rid of the heatsinking issue you were having on the 7805 in your fat n pretty?

[jimmy]

hi all

finished my orange squezzer!!! i used the layout from tonepad (the hard way... im too cheap to buy press'n'peel   ) and i fired it up first go! very smooth. that thing has some boost on it though! with the volume pot all the way up it starts to distort just a teeny bit but i like it. it sure does make you sound like mark knopfler. any dire straits fans out there build this!!

on the other hand, when i had the orange squeezer driving gus' npn boost, it was no longer a boost. it was an all out fat octave fuzzbox. now thats good if your looking for an all out fat octave fuzzbox, but in not. any suggestions?

im also thinking of recording a soundclip if anyones interested.

[moosapotamus]

charlie, did you ever get rid of the heatsinking issue you were having on the 7805 in your fat n pretty?

Yeah, well... The 7805 in that power supply needs a heatsink. So, I just used a heatsink. It's not really an issue. But, if I make another, I'll probably adapt a different power supply that doesn't run as hot.

http://www.moosapotamus.com/Fat-n-Pretty/fatNpretty.htm

~ Charlie

[darren]

it's just that you were recommending running it with a 12-18V supply, where you're always dropping it to 5.  you only need a 7V supply.  anything above heats it up more.