RIP Rupert Neve

The Sound City board and Rupert are featured in the film by the same name.

I liked the part where Rupert is going on about the magnetizing inductance of some component within the console and Dave's eyes just glaze over. Mine too - and I'm a trained analog engineer who should know something about that, nevermind how it effects the sound of an audio signal.

An interesting link to an interview with Dave Grohl where he talks about the Sound City desk that Rupert designed. Dave Grohl Finds Music's Human Element — In A Machine : NPR

RIP
 

I'm not sure I'd be describing RN as the 'Steve Jobs of audio' that would likely be doing him a disservice (Guardian.. :confused:)

A good friend of mine interviewed Rupert for a magazine article quite a few years ago. By all accounts Rupert was an absolute gentleman and man of real
integrity with an amazing work ethic, still actively involved in product design in his 90's.

He was, as he termed it, 'QBE' which means qualified by experience. No degree but a huge amount of knowledge gained over the span of an amazing career.

RIP Rupert .

TCD
 
I own and have watched 'Sound City' quite a few times. Rupert says something about "DC flowing in the transformer" (and its effects) when Dave thought-bubbles that he's a high school drop-out. What always struck me as odd, is that you can't transform DC, so I've never figured out exactly what he meant. If he were referring to a transformer-cored inductor, then it would make sense.

RIP, Rupert- You brought us a lot of great recordings by proxy of your wonderful mixing board. I never met you, but I admired your skills.

Dave said it best- He didn't want the board to end up in a museum. He wanted to ******* use it; and use it A LOT!

Later,
Wolf
 
He's referring to DC flowing through a transformer with a gapped core, with an AC waveform superimposed on it, essentially like you would see in a single-ended tube amplifier.

Rupert was an amazing engineer in that he understood how to design a transformer (and a circuit, for that matter) to be perfectly imperfect- that is to say, to have nonlinearities that are very pleasing to the human ear. Most people agree that the Neve 1073 is a very colored mic preamp, but the way it does so is often found to be a positive attribute.

A lot of Rupert's most loved designs would be deeply hated on the ASR forum, but they are deeply loved in recording studios for a very good reason.
 
Probably THE most famous name in mic pres to have ever lived. I had no idea we lost him this month, but knew the day was coming. I've enjoyed watched him in interviews and reading about his life over the years. A very interesting person and a full well lived life. I found it interesting that he wanted to pursue his dream for his life's work and his wife said, well, do it, at a young age in his career. I will keep my 1073 build for life.
 
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Very sad news but not surprising.
May he rest in peace.
Neve ( but not AMS/Neve), Focusrite ( Forte Blue made on order for Olympic Studios), Amek ( 9098i is his design), RND are all his baby.

Lots of great circuit design and tools. He was an incredible EE but a poor businessman. And he was mostly against the 'mainstream' with his latest designs ( in seek of colourless pristine signalpath).

He was the last alive of the three guys who changed music production during 60's/70's in UK: Barry Porter ( Trident, Cadac,Raindirk), Dick Swettenham ( Helios, Olympic Studio founder), R.Neve.

A page which turns.
 
I'll never forget being called in to repair a large Neve console, with a choir in the studio waiting for me to find the noisy op-amp so they could continue the recording session. Tracking down a lazy old NE5534 can take me hours in those mixers, very difficult.
So I found and replaced the dud IC and walked into the studio to listen to the choir singing and then back into the control room. I was astonished at how good the console sounded. Hundreds of NE5534's and it sounded great.

It shattered all my notions about audio op-amps and I learned Neve's designs are masterpieces. His attention to detail in circuits mattered more to sound quality than the parts themselves. Cost was not priority #1, compared to today's products.
 
This was the desk in my office at work for 20 years. RIP Rupert.
 

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I'll never forget being called in to repair a large Neve console, with a choir in the studio waiting for me to find the noisy op-amp so they could continue the recording session. Tracking down a lazy old NE5534 can take me hours in those mixers, very difficult.
So I found and replaced the dud IC and walked into the studio to listen to the choir singing and then back into the control room. I was astonished at how good the console sounded. Hundreds of NE5534's and it sounded great.

It shattered all my notions about audio op-amps and I learned Neve's designs are masterpieces. His attention to detail in circuits mattered more to sound quality than the parts themselves. Cost was not priority #1, compared to today's products.

The most sought after and best sounding Neve consoles were the older all discrete models.

Yes, 90% of pro consoles use a LOT of 5532/4's. Implementation is key. Having said that if you upgrade the 5534's with newer opa's they can be improved and it is clearly audible. Usually master section yields best results for effort / money (as you would expect).

TCD
 
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^ doesn't agree with that view (but i'am about opamp implementation).
Focusrite, Amek and RND ( not all as there is some discrete design/ high voltage rails units like it's latest consoles) are based upon typical opa.

The historic Neve consoles ( 80xx series) are really great sounding but doesn't fullfill requirements for 'modern' style production most of the time.
At least this is what i've seen in the part of the industry i've worked in: there is always a (pair) of 1073 or 1081 in gear list but they are mainly used for voices.
Their appeal mainly lies in the fact they were used by 'reference' ( G.Martin at AIR's studio but other artists too like The Who, etc, etc,...) for 'historic' release.

The same things happened with microphone ( U47 tube used by the beetles or F.Sinistra) compressor ( Fair child 660 or modified Altec 436/438 - know as emi rs124 or thermoionic culture phoenix),...

It is all an hype thing. Classical rock and roll being less and less leading the industry they'll slowly fade away and be replaced by what made the hip hop sound during 80's/90's as the next big thing ( can't wait to see Adat and 02R going back into flavour!...and C800G as the next holy grail for mics...or studio projects mics! Vintage chinese capsules...).

Anyway it doesn't change the quality of what he produced.
 
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