As guitarists, we can appreciate the value of old technology. After all, our amps are rife with it. Tubes, capacitors, resistors, big old hairy transformers, all of the stuff that helps us get our tone. Most of us could check out an old amp no problem. But as we get into computer gear, sometimes we get a little hesitant about buying vintage gear. Things like tube Mic pre's, or tube compressors, or older mixing desks (consoles we say here).

A while back, I came into an old Amek desk. (Now, going into this I will say that in my younger days, I was a component level technician, working on RADAR systems and the like for fighter aircraft, so this task wasn't as daunting as it might be for some.) However, I knew when I got the desk that it was in bad shape. The power supply was shot, I had no idea how many channels worked or not, but was told that there were more channels that didn't work than did. This was the old desk in the "D" room of a big studio. At the same time, I knew I could bring it back to life. It took three months of taking it completely apart, rebuilding the power supply, turning it on and finding out which channels worked or not, then fixing them. Putting it all back together, and making some updates of my own; mostly putting in newer, quieter op amp chips and new coupling capacitors. At any rate, what I ended up with was a 26 X 8 X 2 killer console, with full patch bay, great EQs and mic Pre's. I've done about a dozen complete CD's on it, and countless sessions.

I also use it as the ultimate rehearsal tool using the 8 Aux sends as four stereo headphone mixes for my band. I have a V-Drum kit, that can go direct, plus I bring in the Keys, Bass, and my guitar direct, and a talk-back mic, and vocal mic in the room (it IS rehearsal after all) and give each cat their own headphone mix. We can rehearse for hours at no cost, no ear fatigue, and no neighbor complaints.

The reason I write all of this, is because I've had a rash of musician buddies either go buy an old mixing desk, or want to, and they're coming to me to see if it's a good thing to do or not. So I'd write about buying old gear.

In buying used gear, the first thing I do is ask myself this question: "Can I, or someone I know, perform maintenance on this?" After all, it IS old gear, and things are going to go bad after a time. If you yourself are a tech, is it in your range of technical ability? If you're not a tech, do you have a regular shop tech, or a buddy you trust that's a tech? That needs to be in place.

Second, with the Web being what it is, do some research. In ten minutes, one can pretty much find out anything about a piece of gear. The important thing here being, can you get parts for this piece of gear? If it has tubes, what kind are they? Who still makes them, and how much are they? If it has more than one of the same type tube in a circuit, can you get matched sets like you can for guitar amps? Are there IC (Integrated Circuit) chips that may need to get replaced, and can you get them?

If you buy the gear, like a mixing desk, or an older piece of gear, run signals through it. (Note: If the peak LED's are burned out, that's NOT a good sign!) There are places to buy tone generators, but a good reference CD is cool. It will have many different test tones at different panning positions and in mono so that you can see if the gear will:

A. Even pass audio
B. Pass audio with no distortion
C. Show correct levels on VU meters and LED bars
D. Show that all parts of the signal path are good. (Switches, faders, pan knobs, input gain knobs, etc)
E. Pass signal at all of the input and output jacks.

If it passes all of these simple tests, buy it. If it fails some tests, but you know the tech that can troubleshoot and repair, or which parts to change yourself, go for it. Check all of the solder joints, I've seen many a ground hum, or buzz issue arise from a cold, or cracked solder joint. Also clean all of the Pots, or potentiometers (the knobs).

Using older analogue gear with your computer rig can be a wonderful world of old school tone, and warmth, combined with the razor quick tools of the computer. Some common tricks I use are to run all the instruments through the console mic pre's. Because with an old console, you automatically get a bunch of great mic pre's instead of just a two channel device.

Then I bus them out through 16 bus outputs into my computer interface. This to me, warms up the signal(s) going into the computer. Then, when mixing, I use the popular technique of bringing 8 stereo pairs or "stems" back to the console. Perhaps drums all bussed to a stereo mix in the software, rhythm instruments to another pair, Back up vox to another, rhythm guitar to another, lead vox to another stereo pair, etc. I run these stems into and through the mixing desk to "warm" them up again, put EQ touches on the over all of each stem, I can also ride the faders of multiple channels while mixing (which I can't do in computer without grouping, which is often NOT what I want.)

I still perform my usual EQs, effects, panning, and automation in Logic, I'm using the console as an analogue path. I then record the stereo mix out of the mixing desk back into the computer as my final mix. For me, this works really well.

So the point is, buying older more vintage gear can be a really good thing. Just make certain of the points above, about parts and repair, and go have fun!

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