T-RackS Vintage Program EQ 1A boosts transients in Bass area? is that normal?

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So i have this EQ by IKM for quite a while but never used it tbh. So i decided to play around with it and its so strange, whenever i boost low frequencies i feel like transients are being pushed. Like theres some compression applied. Is real Pultec also behave like that?

I have tried other Pultec emulations by Waves & Native Instruments aka Softubes Enchanted EQ (its based on different Pultec emulation) and none of those behave like that. Waves and NI behaves similar despite being different.

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So where are KVR experts when you need them? :-D

Anyways i have also tried few other Pultec emulations and what is also strange that none of my tried ones does not introduce such brutal distortion at low frequencies as T-Racks one.

Just out of curiosity wrote to IKmultimedia if its made by design or a bug, because its very strangate that of 5 tested Pultec emulations one made by IKM behaves very different then other 4. Like a black sheep in the herd.

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I wonder if there is some difference in the phase response or group delay? This could change the way transients are perceived while the frequency curve is the same. This could be determined using the Plugin Analyzer, or freezing the output on a multichannel oscilloscope when comparing different plugins.

Another possibility is the saturation modelling; it's not clear to me which models include saturation. What happens if you change the gain-staging by padding down the signal before the EQ and boosting it afterwards? This will help determine whether the issue is linear or not...

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imrae wrote:I wonder if there is some difference in the phase response or group delay? This could change the way transients are perceived while the frequency curve is the same. This could be determined using the Plugin Analyzer, or freezing the output on a multichannel oscilloscope when comparing different plugins.

Another possibility is the saturation modelling; it's not clear to me which models include saturation. What happens if you change the gain-staging by padding down the signal before the EQ and boosting it afterwards? This will help determine whether the issue is linear or not...
I also thought thats the case, but gain staging is not the case, because while other plugins produce more low frequencies at same output IKM version just produce pure distortion

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Elektronisch wrote: I also thought thats the case, but gain staging is not the case, because while other plugins produce more low frequencies at same output IKM version just produce pure distortion
It's not unusual for different plugins to have different gain-staging though, and linear processes (i.e. EQ without saturation) don't have to worry about it. Does the IKM version clean up when you reduce the input level?

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imrae wrote:
Elektronisch wrote: I also thought thats the case, but gain staging is not the case, because while other plugins produce more low frequencies at same output IKM version just produce pure distortion
It's not unusual for different plugins to have different gain-staging though, and linear processes (i.e. EQ without saturation) don't have to worry about it. Does the IKM version clean up when you reduce the input level?
Here is the thing, if i put the same input gain and dont boost the Bass its alright, but when i boost at the same level (lets say 7) on IKM plugin you hear how there is aplied some transient compresion (but it also depends on material), there is huge TICK sound if the input gain is significant and if you push a little higher the sound becomes very distorted and if i put the output level lower the sound doesnt change. WHen i do the same on other emulations there is no transient compression applied, sound is not distorted, and bass feels solid and in place :)

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Funnily enough, I've had this for a while and haven't really used it myself, which is really terrible actually!! Haha!!

There's a thing where if I see too many people doing something I tend to avoid doing it myself. I guess because I just don't like copying for the sake of copying. A bit weird really. Anyway, it meant that I kind of stopped using it.

There is this guy floating around on the forum, Peter from IK. He's got a T-RackS 5 post up.

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=491107

Maybe if you had a chat with him.

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Sorry, I had seen this and I received information back from our developers: Yes, when the output goes above max output level (0dB) by more than 6dB the output can have this behavior. It is not happening with levels aside from those that go way above the max 0dB level.

We will consider if there are future changes possible (but that would be within T-RackS 5.x).

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Peter - IK Multimedia wrote:Sorry, I had seen this and I received information back from our developers: Yes, when the output goes above max output level (0dB) by more than 6dB the output can have this behavior. It is not happening with levels aside from those that go way above the max 0dB level.

We will consider if there are future changes possible (but that would be within T-RackS 5.x).
Thats good to hear that the developers know about this and consider! :) Thank you Peter! :)

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Peter - IK Multimedia wrote:Sorry, I had seen this and I received information back from our developers: Yes, when the output goes above max output level (0dB) by more than 6dB the output can have this behavior. It is not happening with levels aside from those that go way above the max 0dB level.

We will consider if there are future changes possible (but that would be within T-RackS 5.x).
Speaking of the devil.

So is that a bug and not an actual characteristic of the unit IK modelled??

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Peter - IK Multimedia wrote:Sorry, I had seen this and I received information back from our developers: Yes, when the output goes above max output level (0dB) by more than 6dB the output can have this behavior. It is not happening with levels aside from those that go way above the max 0dB level.

We will consider if there are future changes possible (but that would be within T-RackS 5.x).
That is some serious plug-in abuse :o Anything above 0dBFS nevermind +6dBFS means -> end-user error in my book, if you do that on your master buss -> you'll clip your converters.

I would expect the bass to distort a bit at high levels and fuzz out at extreme levels, transformers distort the low end way more than the mids or high end, and the EQ1A has 3 transformers in the audio path, not to mention the inductors in the EQ section. An inductor in an oversimplified manner can be considered to be like half a transformer. Though I doubt the inductors will distorts in this configuration.

Assuming the reproduction transformers' specs are correct(Sowter), the Triad HS-56 input transformer is rated at max level +17dBu @50Hz - that is a little on the low side, especially considering the Peerless S-217-D output transformer which is a very good transformer. The Triad HS-56 frequency response is quoted as 10Hz to 30kHz which is good though.

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Here is picture showing what happens when i increase a boost and you see those transients comming up? that starts to happen when i hit the value of 5 on the boost knob. It seems like there is some internal transient processor.
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Thanks for this tip. I'm going to try and exploit this behavior to get more attack out of a tubby electric bass track.

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Elektronisch wrote:Here is picture showing what happens when i increase a boost and you see those transients comming up? that starts to happen when i hit the value of 5 on the boost knob. It seems like there is some internal transient processor.
If the audio in the tranient part of the signal shown is within the peak boost area of the EQ , and the "sustain" part has frequencies out side of the EQ peak, then this is the expected result. the tranients and the "sustain" both increase proportionally as you'd expect turning up the band gain. I would guess this is a kick drum with a deep initial attack and more boxy sustain. it could also included added distortion as the gain is increased depending on how the model was made.

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plexuss wrote:
Elektronisch wrote:Here is picture showing what happens when i increase a boost and you see those transients comming up? that starts to happen when i hit the value of 5 on the boost knob. It seems like there is some internal transient processor.
If the audio in the tranient part of the signal shown is within the peak boost area of the EQ , and the "sustain" part has frequencies out side of the EQ peak, then this is the expected result. the tranients and the "sustain" both increase proportionally as you'd expect turning up the band gain. I would guess this is a kick drum with a deep initial attack and more boxy sustain. it could also included added distortion as the gain is increased depending on how the model was made.
You see the waveform? Do you see peaking transient at the beginning? None of the eqs does this. I have been working in music production industry for many years and this is the first eq that does this.

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