All,
I am looking at high quality mic pre's, and aside from the focusrite
discrete stuff, it is looking like I am going to be paying well over 1k for
a decent mic pre. (upper 10% in sound quality)

I have used the focusrite platinum line stuff and it seems somewhat smooth,
really clean with a great frequency response, but somewhat grainy. I get
good results, but not quite as smooth as I am looking for.

Is it possible to build your own very high quality tube preamp, I am
thinking like an M610 type of pre, for less than it costs to buy an M610,
and still get the same sound quality? Is the M610 considered a top quality,
no frills preamp? This is the one I am considering buying.

I don't really want compression or an eq. Just a couple of gain pots and a
meter, phase switch, maybe a ground lift, but I want to do it right with a
really clean, relatively simple, and good sounding circuit.

I have some software plugins that get pretty good results for compression if
I need it, a UAD card. I just want something I can record a cool enough
output with (into the DAW) with, to preserve all of the transients without
digital clipping, uncompressed, but is clean enough that I can work the
recording in software and do things like apply the UAD's LA2A and slam it
if the artist wants to, without excessive preamp noise becoming an issue. I
want the original tracks to be uncompressed.

I know that a lot of people like to put a limiter between the preamp and
DAW, but I want the cleanest, shortest signal path possible.

Is there a really good tube preamp plan out there that I can purchase or
download that some of the more experienced people here can recommend as a
great sounding, no frills preamp? Is there a plan out there for a Neve 1073
(or similar) clone that really does sound as good as a Neve? I am not
concerned with having a tube amp as much as I am concerned with a great
sounding, smooth preamp design (or 3). If I can build it myself and the
design stands up to A-List equipment, and it is substantially less
expensive... I will be very happy. I would prefer having at least one tube
preamp in my gear list, and if it is there, I want it to be a good one, even
if it is a home-built.

My dad is a really good equipment tech (including tube) (40 years, starting
in the navy and still does it) and has offered to lend me his expertise to
help build it. I am not exactly second guessing him, but want to show him
some of the plans and schematics that are floating around out here for this
job before I commit the circuit to solder. If there are some designs people
are passionate about, I want to look at them and run them by Dad : )

I am pretty new to the studio type high end input chain stuff so please go
easy on me. I do like to do things the hard way and learn by doing so, so
please don't bust my ass and tell me to just save my money: )

Any recommendations would be appreciated.

thx,
2mb

I think rec.audio.pro may be a better newsgroup for this...

Is it possible to build your own very high quality tube preamp, I am
thinking like an M610 type of pre, for less than it costs to buy an M610,
and still get the same sound quality?

Yes, of course it is. I have absolutely no idea what an M610 is, but
that shouldn't matter much :-)

I started building a tube mic pre a year ago, but I never got rith of
all the hum. But others have built it, and tells me it sounds good -
have a look he

http://stiftsbogtrykkeriet.dk/~mcs/micpre/

Also have a look at the Gyraf website (http://gyraf.dk/)

Best regards,

Mikkel C. Simonsen