Having trouble with this build? Read the 1176 FAQ.
In July of 2007 Ed and I started to converse about the 1108 preamp. I remember that it was a favorite of soundguy Dave. Ed pointed out that the 1108 preamp circuit was also used in the earliest version of the 1176 compressor.
I'd never noticed before that there was an 1176 with a totally different pre and line amp - one that had an FET as the first active element of each stage. Apparently there were very few made and are coveted by some big name mixers. Looking back I think Ed had hoped that I would make a PCB to build an 1108, but when I finally figured out there was a whole new (well, old really) 1176 then I had to make one.
In April of '08 I began working on the board in earnest and had it pretty much done in May. But Ed thought it would be nice to add some pads to make it easy to mount alternative coupling capacitors in the audio path. He said that the wound construction caps give a slightly different sound to the ones made with a stacked construction. Due to other commitments I didn't get back around to it until September.
Here's the finished board - in blue as in bluestripe - with Sprague Orange Drop capacitors:
click image to enlarge
Amazingly, it all worked first try (I did not prototype with a home etched board as I usually do). To me, it sounds more aggressive than the Rev D. I was worried that the pre-LN designs would be significantly noisier than the later models. In fact, this one measured only 3.4dB noiser than the 1176 Low Noise Rev D.
I'm totally happy with it and am looking forward to putting it in a nice case. Big thanks to Ed.
~The PDF file including BOM, schematic and self-etch files for the original version.
~My Rev A page (still in progress).
~BOM for V1.2 boards (earlier version).
~Documentation including overlay and schematic for V1.2.5 (currently supplied boards).
~I really suggest you make your own decisions about which components you use. Choosing components is more than half the fun. But if you can't be $&#*ed, Lab member spica has a post for you. I have not verified these components so the risk is yours. Note that this is not for the current V1.2.5 board but for V1.0-1.2.
Boards available here
In July of 2007 Ed and I started to converse about the 1108 preamp. I remember that it was a favorite of soundguy Dave. Ed pointed out that the 1108 preamp circuit was also used in the earliest version of the 1176 compressor.
I'd never noticed before that there was an 1176 with a totally different pre and line amp - one that had an FET as the first active element of each stage. Apparently there were very few made and are coveted by some big name mixers. Looking back I think Ed had hoped that I would make a PCB to build an 1108, but when I finally figured out there was a whole new (well, old really) 1176 then I had to make one.
In April of '08 I began working on the board in earnest and had it pretty much done in May. But Ed thought it would be nice to add some pads to make it easy to mount alternative coupling capacitors in the audio path. He said that the wound construction caps give a slightly different sound to the ones made with a stacked construction. Due to other commitments I didn't get back around to it until September.
Here's the finished board - in blue as in bluestripe - with Sprague Orange Drop capacitors:
click image to enlarge
Amazingly, it all worked first try (I did not prototype with a home etched board as I usually do). To me, it sounds more aggressive than the Rev D. I was worried that the pre-LN designs would be significantly noisier than the later models. In fact, this one measured only 3.4dB noiser than the 1176 Low Noise Rev D.
I'm totally happy with it and am looking forward to putting it in a nice case. Big thanks to Ed.
~The PDF file including BOM, schematic and self-etch files for the original version.
~My Rev A page (still in progress).
~BOM for V1.2 boards (earlier version).
~Documentation including overlay and schematic for V1.2.5 (currently supplied boards).
~I really suggest you make your own decisions about which components you use. Choosing components is more than half the fun. But if you can't be $&#*ed, Lab member spica has a post for you. I have not verified these components so the risk is yours. Note that this is not for the current V1.2.5 board but for V1.0-1.2.
Boards available here
Not really an expert except maybe in my actual profession of digital camera repair...BTW I got all the parts from Mouser except for the transformers.
