The end of 2018 is upon us and we have had a lot of great gear come through our doors. With the shopping season around the corner, we wanted to share a short list of our favorites to help you choose the best recording gear for the engineer in your life.
Earlier in the year, Audient revealed what would become one of the highest quality desktop interfaces ever to be available. The English company is the only one to use the same preamps throughout their entire line of products. From their massive $90,000 consoles to the $200 iD4, you will hear the exact same headroom and preamp quality. The iD44 is equipped with 4 of these preamps, 16 channels of digital I/O, 4 analog outputs and tons of built-in and/or assignable functions. With the 4 analog outputs, you can use two sets of monitors and have access to seamless monitor switching at the touch of a button. The ScrollControl, as seen on the iD4 and iD14, is now in place on the iD44 as well! Something many people missed on the iD22 was the ability to easily write automation and scroll across their session using the big, silver knob. We're glad to see Audient brought it back!
Perhaps one of the finest condenser microphones ever constructed is the LCT-540S from Lewitt. As per it's name, SUBZERO means that this microphone is even better than human hearing. Check it out: Lewitt is one of the finest makers of condenser microphones. You can't go wrong with any of their options. Click here to check out the rest of the Lewitt line.
Since 1999, Arturia has been most known for their software synths. The Arturia V-Collection has made its way into many home and professional studios and is a favorite among producers. More recently, the French company has been creating hardware and analog synthesizers. The MiniBrute 2 is one of their best works yet due to the build quality, routing options and overall ease of use. In this video, Sebastian from Arturia walks us through the guts of the MiniBrute 2:
PreSonus has had a big year in terms of product releases. Their new line of Studio Series interfaces, StudioLive Series 3 and the Holy Grail that is Studio One Version 4 (see here) to name just a few. Despite all of the massive improvements in technology over the last few years, the classic Faderport from 2007 is still a favorite of engineers everywhere. It allows easy integration to most DAW's for transport control, automation and overall just getting your hands off the mouse and being able to focus on the music again. Within the last year, we got the FaderPort 8 and 16, but I think many people (myself included) are most excited about the updates to the classic FaderPort. To learn more about the new PreSonus FaderPort, check out our article here.
Great gear doesn't always have to be hardware. Softube makes some of the best plugins available and are essential pieces of many of the best modern records. The Weiss DS-1 MK3 plugin is no exception. The original Weiss hardware mastering unit is famous among mastering engineers and considered to be an indispensable component to any serious engineer's arsenal. Although the hardware unit is a digital processor, it has certain qualities within the algorithms that cause it to be a transparent and versatile limiter, unlike many of it's other digital competitors. Because it uses algorithms and not electronic components to process the audio, Softube could literally copy every algorithm and make a plugin of the DS-1. Not an emulation, but a direct copy of the entire hardware so you get this exact same sound in your computer. The hardware DS-1 MK3 is available for just under $9000. Now, you can get the software version for only $549! Thanks for checking out our list of the best new recording gear of 2018! Click here to see our other Buyer's Guides. As always, enjoy FAST and FREE shipping on any order in the continental US. If you have any questions or comments, feel free to give us a toll free call at 855-269-0474, or stop in our store in Downtown Appleton! Be sure to check out our other articles here.