M-Audio Preamplifiers

M-Audio delivers great sounding preamps for every application and budget. Sales of M-Audio Audio Buddy, DMP3, Octane, and Tampa preamplifiers at Sweetwave Audio. For assistance, call us at 1-877-258-0563.

M-Audio Audio Buddy

If you're looking for a whole lot of preamp on a tight budget, you'll see where this popular product gets its name. Affordability and performance make the Audio Buddy one of the most popular mic preamps in home recording today. You get professional microphone support along with line inputs impedance-matched for ideal performance with electric guitar and bass. Simply put, the Audio Buddy is a workhorse mic preamp that sounds great and won't hurt your budget.

Features

• 2-channel mic/instrument preamp
• XLR mic ins; 1/4” instrument ins; balanced 1/4” outs
• phantom power
• ultra-compact
• 5Hz-50kHz frequency response

M-Audio DMP3

Based on the M-Audio preamp technology that won Pro Audio Review's highest accolades, the DMP3's amazing 20Hz to 100kHz frequency response makes it ideal for today's 96k recording work. You also get exceptional dynamic range to capture all the nuances of your music—not to mention an unbelievable 66dB of gain. And the classic VU meters are just one indication of the soul you'll find in the DMP3's sound. Whether you use it live or in the studio, the DMP3 2-channel microphone/instrument preamp is a piece of gear destined to be integral in defining your sound.

Features

• 2-channel mic/instrument preamp
• XLR mic ins; 1/4” instrument ins; balanced 1/4” outs
• high 66dB available gain
• 48V phantom power
• 20Hz to 80kHz frequency response

M-Audio Octane

The 8-channel Octane preamp is specifically designed to enhance the front end of any multitrack digital recording system. Its award-winning M-Audio preamp technology delivers pristine digital signals to any Lightpipe-compatible devices such as hard disk recorders and digital mixers. Octane is ideal for miking drum kits or bands—and the two mic/instrument channels are great for guitar, bass and other instruments. M-S matrix encoding lets you employ stereo miking techniques previously available only in pro studios. Octane even has analog preamp (direct) outs for each channel, making it the perfect upgrade for any digital audio interface or mixer. Word clock also means that you can sync multiple Octanes for as many channels as you need as your studio grows.

Features

• award-winning M-Audio preamp technology
• 8 mic preamp channels, 2 with instrument ins
• 8 line inputs
• ADAT Lightpipe output (TOSlink)
• 24-bit audio resolution throughout

M-Audio TAMPA (discontinued)

TAMPA is a professional microphone/instrument preamp unlike any other. That's because M-Audio's design team set out to discover just why expensive tube technology sounds so good, and devise a way to land that sound at affordable solid state prices. The result is far beyond tube modeling. It's a whole new technology called Temporal Harmonic Alignment™. TAMPA even has a built-in world-class dual optical servo compressor offering low noise and distortion, consistent accuracy and exceptional transparency. You also get a digital output for driving your digital recording gear directly without degradation.

Temporal Harmonic Alignment — the secret behind the sound
In natural sound sources such as strings, drum heads and vocal chords, harmonics share a characteristic temporal (phase) relationship to the fundamental. Our ears exhibit the same qualities. Solid state electronics induce distortion in the form of additional harmonics that are out of phase with the original source. Tube-based devices strike the ear as having such a “warm” sound because the added harmonics have the same temporal relationship as natural mechanisms (although predominantly in the midrange). This results in a sweet spot that makes vocals, guitars and other midrange-rich content sound especially pleasing. TAMPA's revolutionary new Temporal Harmonic Alignment technology produces that same phase relationship found in both tubes and nature. And unlike tubes, TAMPA's sweet spot spans the full spectrum of your sound.

Dual Optical Servo Compressor
TAMPA also includes a dual optical servo compressor that is worth the price alone. Three fundamental problems plague engineers in designing compressors—distortion, noise and accuracy. The VCA technology used in inexpensive compressors exhibits less than professional specs on all three counts. Simple optical servo technology is much more quiet and accurate, yet has its own issues with distortion. The dual optical servo technology we use in TAMPA yields low noise, consistent accuracy, low distortion and exceptional transparency—and it comes built-in to a great mic preamp.

Features

• temporally-aligned harmonics for natural sound
• built-in dual servo compressor
• direct 24-bit digital S/PDIF and AES/EBU output
• Class A circuitry throughout
• classic VU meters