Apogee ensemble - nousy preamp at high gain

Hi there

I have that awesome box, seriously, it's really clean sounding converters. I have bought it about 5 years ago and never had any complaints untill recently. I tested some vintage condensers microphone (vintage U87, km84). And must say, these pre aren't that clean at 50db of gain and more, that is the gain you need to work with these vintage babies.

Of course, in these days of so sensitive mics that you can hear a flies fart at the other end of the house, there is no trouble at 30/40 db of gain, but hiss become more apparent at high level, which surprised me a little. Of coyrse, there is a pletora of good high gain mic pre out there, but i wanted to share this experience.

Happy holidays guys

I've never used the pres on the Ensemble, although I have used the converters. 

Having used older U87 and KM84 a lot I don't think you need 50dB of gain for all but the quietest of sources.  They both have decent output level.

One thing you might want to check is how the output impedance straps are set internally on the Neumanns.  This will affect the output level of the mic, a quick google will reveal lots on the topic, for example

http://repforums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/topic,1421.msg7812.html#msg7812

Thanks. 50db of gain was more for some normal vocals, speech or quiet source, bot drum or amps, or piano, etc. Good idea about thé impedance, i'll check it out. I was just surprises that thé pres were mo cleaner at high gain, but on another hand, with modern mics and all, we dont really need that amount of gain