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<blockquote data-quote="John Roberts" data-source="post: 58784" data-attributes="member: 126">re: X32 DiscussionNot to add to the veer, historically early digital conversions were not very tolerant of overload, so it was prudent to saturate the analog path before the digital code could roll over (very nasty sounding). Modern digital conversion is much more benign when saturated but still not very desirable (IMO). I already added my $0.02 in a midas thread about adding a soft clipping feature to mic preamps.&nbsp; Regarding mic preamp &quot;sound&quot;, when not clipped, most sound very alike, because they are. When clipped they still &quot;should&quot; sound mostly similar, only somewhat less similar due to perhaps subtly different added distortion (not talking about a dedicated soft clipper).&nbsp; I suspect perceived headroom differences between some brands may be influenced by gain pot law, gain structure, metering, etc. Way off topic for this thread, so I apologize.JRPS: Midas is not the only company to dabble into nonlinear transfer function at the top of the range to give the appearance of increased headroom or&nbsp; dynamic range. IIRC DBX was playing some games with one series of digital GEQ., and lets not forget all the clip limiters in analog power amps,,,&nbsp; Power to our inner DJ .&nbsp; <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":-)" title="Smile&nbsp; &nbsp; :-)"&nbsp; data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":-)" /></blockquote>

[QUOTE="John Roberts, post: 58784, member: 126"] re: X32 Discussion Not to add to the veer, historically early digital conversions were not very tolerant of overload, so it was prudent to saturate the analog path before the digital code could roll over (very nasty sounding). Modern digital conversion is much more benign when saturated but still not very desirable (IMO). I already added my $0.02 in a midas thread about adding a soft clipping feature to mic preamps. Regarding mic preamp "sound", when not clipped, most sound very alike, because they are. When clipped they still "should" sound mostly similar, only somewhat less similar due to perhaps subtly different added distortion (not talking about a dedicated soft clipper). I suspect perceived headroom differences between some brands may be influenced by gain pot law, gain structure, metering, etc. Way off topic for this thread, so I apologize. JR PS: Midas is not the only company to dabble into nonlinear transfer function at the top of the range to give the appearance of increased headroom or dynamic range. IIRC DBX was playing some games with one series of digital GEQ., and lets not forget all the clip limiters in analog power amps,,, Power to our inner DJ . :-) [/QUOTE]

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