Warm Audio WA-MPX Single Channel Tube Microphone Preamp

General

A must-have for any purist, the Warm Audio WA-MPX preamp proves that there's no need to remortgage the house to gain access to sweet, valve-coated sound. This unit has been based on the classic AMPEX 351 tape valve amplifier that, in the fifties and sixties, was famously teamed up with a tape machine designed by none-other-than Les Paul to provide a neat route to high-quality audio in the professional recording studios of the time. And the rest, as they say, is history. To get a taste of this preamp's achievements, you need only look at the work of names like Les Paul, Elvis Presley, Bing Crosby, Nat King Cole and Roy Orbinson, but even big-hitters like nineties alt-rock producer Steve Albini are still massive AMPEX 351 devotees.

An Authentic 531-Style Valve Microphone Preamp

The preamp section of the Warm Audio WA-MPX has been equipped with three valves that have been paired with custom-made CineMag transformers. This combo is exactly what delivers the unmistakable analogue quality of sound that you just can't quite get with a plugin or digital emulation. The setup also does a lot for the dynamic range, so quieter instruments and audio sources like ribbon microphones are given a natural boost by the clean signal path, while louder instruments can be flavoured with some hefty drive and richly saturated distortion. The analogue components apply a natural compression and saturation that's akin to tape units running at 15 IPS, and to round everything off, this unit provides both low-pass and hi-pass filters to shave off the more excessive higher and lower frequencies. Every model has been extensively tested by hand before it can leave the Warm Audio lab, so you're assured of ultra-reliable performance and excellent valve-driven preamplification, just at a fraction of the price of a vintage original.