The PEAK LIMITER/CLIPPER control is just to the right of the expander controls. Its effect is very noticeable and functions well when using the box as a mike processor. Not being a harmonic generator, this exciter circuit acts very much like an EQ section devoted primarily to upper mid and high frequencies. The frequencies to be "excited" are determined by the FREQUENCY control setting. Highs are detected then boosted an amount set by the LEVEL control. Audio first hits a high pass band filter and then enters an upward expander with a slope of 1:1.5. The LEVEL control is adjustable from 0 to 10 and the FREQUENCY control from 4kHz to 15kHz. Next stop on the panel tour brings us to the LEVEL and FREQUENCY controls of the EXCITER section of the box. Noise gates - if you've got 'em, use 'em! This control also sets the attack time of the gate. The HOLD time sets the time it takes for the noise gate to close once audio drops below the threshold. The THRESHOLD obviously sets the level at which the gate will "open" and allow audio to pass. The THRESHOLD is adjustable from -90dBm to +20dBm, and the HOLD time is adjustable from 15ms to 2 seconds. There are two controls for the noise gate: the THRESHOLD and the HOLD time. Noise gates should be standard gear in a multi-track production studio (if outboard noise reduction is not in use), and it's wonderful to see this function on the MDC-2001. Most of these multi-track rooms use analog recorders which result in more tape hiss and other noise being mixed into that spot or promo. Most are four and eight track rooms, and some are sixteen. There are more multi-track production rooms in radio today than ever before. Next to the expander controls are the NOISE GATE controls. Set at 1:3, a 1dB decrease in input below the set threshold will result in a 3dB reduction at the output. The SLOPE control sets the amount of work the expander does. The THRESHOLD control sets the level at which the expander starts working. With proper settings, pauses between words become dead silent even though large amounts of compression are being used and noticeable room noise is present. Its effect is most noticeable when using the MDC as a voice processor. This downward expander works in conjunction with the compressor and helps to reduce noise when there are lulls in the input signal. The THRESHOLD can be set from -50dBm to +20dBm and the SLOPE can be set from 1:1 to 1:5. Next up we have the two expander controls. The de-esser in the MDC is designed to remove sibilance when using large amounts of compression. The more you crank it, the more the pre-set high frequency band is suppressed. The de-esser function is pretty straight-forward. The next knob we get to play with is the DE-ESSER LEVEL control. Both the ATTACK and RELEASE controls also have an internal "Auto Adjust" feature which analyzes the dynamics of the incoming signal and "fine tunes" the two controls continuously. 1 second to one full second - enough for most any application. At the 50ms level, the attack time nicely smooths out the attack of the unit. At the lowest setting, the attack is very quick and "punchy" with the compression level high. The range on the RATIO control is 1:1 to 40:1. At full tilt, the compression is very clean. Likewise, when set at -40dB, anything above -40dB on the input will get compressed. At +10dB, only levels above +10dB are compressed. The INPUT control sets the sensitivity of the compressor by adjusting the threshold from -40dB to +10dB. You get an INPUT control, a RATIO control, and controls for ATTACK and RELEASE times. Plus, there are two "detector" circuits with insert points that allow for some interesting effects.Īt the far left of the front panel are the controls for the compressor section. This full stereo processor offers a compressor, a de-esser, an ex-pander, a noise gate, an exciter, and a peak limiter/clipper. You get what you would expect from a "dynamics processor" and more. ART's new MDC-2001 packs all the dynamics processing you could want on one neatly designed, single rack space unit.
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