Author: mattwaddell

“The 302 was a product that Libby Koomar (Mechanical Engineer) and I squeezed out during the tumultuous development of the 7-Series recorders. We were getting asked regularly for a mixer that fit in between the MixPre (too small) and the 442 (too big). Circuitry-wise, the 302 was fairly straightforward, mostly being a cut-and-paste exercise from the MP-1/MixPre/442 circuitry. However, the mechanical design was difficult because we wanted to use the same extrusion that we used everywhere else – this also ensured its ridiculously small size. Libby and I resorted to all sorts of tricks to make the circuitry fit. Cramming 3 full-sized Lundahl LL1576 mic preamp transformers in meant that we didn’t quite have enough room for the batteries, so Libby let half of one of the batteries protrude out the unit. Jim Koomar (Sales) christened the battery compartment the ‘angry inch’ which was as unorthodox as it was functional. The 302 went on to become one our most popular mixers ever, which we still get asked for today – a hard-to-beat mixture of size, battery life, audio performance, and ruggedness.”

“Back when audio products had mechanical meters, different countries/regions had different types of meters – meter colors, scales, and ballistics were different. An American VU meter with its ‘buff’ colored background would never be confused with a black British PPM meter numbered from 1 to 7. We started with LED meters and avoided mechanical meters since LEDs were inherently more reliable and smaller. However, the meter scale remained a very hot topic, and differed markedly from region of the world to region of the world. The only topic that was debated almost as much was ‘left-hand or right-hand meters??’ The 442N was a request from our European friends and featured a metering scale for the Nordic countries laser etched on the front of the unit (we as Americans thought the scale was fairly odd, but it is what our friends wanted) — and this was a very popular model! Today of course things are easier as we have LCDs and OLEDs with generally everything marked in dBFS.”

“The MM-1 was something we were asked for quite a bit: ‘I need the MP-1, but with a headphone amp.’ This was a fairly short putt product-wise, so we did it: preamp from the MP-1 and headphone amp from the HX-3. This evergreen product is still used for many things, most often along with parabolic mics to provide a nice limiter and headphone amp for the operator. This is still manufactured today on our line in Reedsburg, WI.”

“The vaunted 442 mixer was our entry into ‘the big leagues’ at the time and really put us on the map. We knew that there was a hole in the market for a full-featured, high-end 4-channel portable mixer for around $3000. Jim Koomar (Sales) and I took a trip to Minneapolis to pick [famed product designer] Peter Engh’s brain about what the product needed, and he correctly said ‘it’s all about outputs,’ meaning have many types of outputs along with the input side of things. This is where the 4 direct outs came from. This all-analog circuit is still one of my very favorite designs and near and dear to my heart. The preamps were again copied from the MP-1, complete with their Lundahl transformers and opto-isolator trim limiters. The bus limiters and mixing were done with THAT VCAs. The VCAs were trimmed on the assembly line to null the distortion using DACs and a microcontroller. Libby Koomar (Mechanical Engineer) did a superb job on the elegant mechanical design. She came up with the now-distinctive posts flanking the unit, giving it such style, which we still call ‘golf tees’ internally. We had a hard time coming up with a name, but I remember when Jon Tatooles (Marketing) came in and suggested ‘442,’ after the famous Oldsmobile muscle car. We all loved it. 4 inputs, 4 direct outs, 2 main outs.”

“The HX-3 was born out of people telling us they loved the headphone amp in the MixPre. This was for good reason, as that headphone amp features 30V of signal swing — all off of a couple of AA batteries. It is one of the many products that we make that I say are ‘sophisticated power supplies with a nice audio circuit hanging off of it.’ After shipping for a few years, this product was ripped off lock, stock, and barrel by an unscrupulous company in Taiwan, which upset me. They even copied my exact PC board layout. I’ve been asked many times: ‘Don’t your product and that other one come off of the same assembly line somewhere in Asia?’ The answer is *no*, we only make this product for Sound Devices – in Reedsburg, WI, USA, where we’re still making and selling it all these years later.”