TL Audio M4 32 Channel Valve Console, what do people think you this. I am pleasantly surprised each group of 8 channels has its own ADAT out so it alot of option.

What do other people think??????

Friends of mine bought the very first VTC built. That very model had been reviewed in a respected audio mag (not SOS I hasten to add!) and the reviewer hailed it as the best ever, bla, bla, bla. The idea was to have something vintage to warm up techno and hip-hop. It's one of those German studios where the customers are excused clothing.

They were a bit disapointed to discover that it is not a valve desk at all, but an ordinary solid state with a valve side-chain for harmonic distortion. They switched it on and the PSU failed.

A new PSU was sent out, they switched it on again and it failed again. A third, larger PSU was then sent out and after a few days, it too failed.

A technician, a real one with master's certificate and a degree in electrical and electronic engineering, was called for and he looked at the desk. That desk as it was designed was incapable of working correctly. The current draw on switch on was too high, the PSU was roughly one-quarter the needed capacity once it was or would be on, the valves were running at the wrong voltage and they were of poor quality.

To cut a long story short, they gave up on the manufacturer and swore that they would never buy anything from Britain ever again. They got their tech friend to rebuild the thing from the ground up using real valves from Siemens and not some cheap rubbish banged out in a sweat shop in Indonesia and they made them run at the correct voltage and the Mickey Mouse power supply unit was replaced with decent 2kW unit with slow-start.

I would imagine that they have got their act together by now and I hear that there are some very happy users of the VTC, but if I were to buy one, I would want to see it working, I would insist that all the valves have the word Siemens stamped on them and that the PSU is double the required capacity and has soft start - i.e. a second or two of trickle current to load up all the caps and bits in the desk.

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www.the-byre.com No longer Forum Member

...dang

I know of a very successful studio that uses one (40 input model I think, its huge) and is very happy. Speak with KMR in North London and ask for Nikki Rogers.

This is totally my opinion and I cant comment on the quality of the power supplies etc supplied with that desk...

Bearing in mind that I own and love some high end valve gear...rather than 'real tube warmth' or whatever it is described as, I would say 'closed and fuzzy'.

That's my opinion of the sound. I'm not qualified to comment on the reliability but from the reports I've heard, I would not buy a VTC unless I could afford to pay for another desk to be installed so that I could work while I sold it.

As with everything internet, I would check things out for yourself and see what you think.

I chose a 36 Channel Audient, and while it's not been 100% perfect (tiny little maintenance issues from time to time as with anything analogue) I just can not tell you how good it is. Stunning. The results speak for themselves. It's superb.

J

As a point of order, the valves in the VTC aren't in a 'side chain' -- they are used as buffer stages int he normal signal path, but the bulk of the circuitry is pretty conventional IC-based stuff, with the valves added harmonic distortion as an effect -- much the same as most other equipment fromthe same manufacturer. It works, some like it, some don't.

I can't comment on the power supply issue with the VTC, but I've not had any problems with the supplies shipped with the M3 and M4 desks supplied for review. 'Inadequate PSUs with British consoles' is a very popular theme with the Byre... possibly with good reason...

Finally, Siemens aren't the only maker of good tubes...

I have reviewed the M4 console and I believe it is scheduled for the December issue of SOS.

Hugh

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Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

I dunno... my 9:4:2 Amek BCII has exactly the same OTT PSU as all Amek desks, it's a 2U rack that weighs only slightly less than the desk... runs very cool without the fan...

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madtheory creations
Synths and pianos for Kontakt

Quote Hugh Robjohns:

---

As a point of order, the valves in the VTC aren't in a 'side chain' -- they are used as buffer stages int he normal signal path, but the bulk of the circuitry is pretty conventional IC-based stuff, with the valves added harmonic distortion as an effect -- much the same as most other equipment fromthe same manufacturer. It works, some like it, some don't.

I can't comment on the power supply issue with the VTC, but I've not had any problems with the supplies shipped with the M3 and M4 desks supplied for review. 'Inadequate PSUs with British consoles' is a very popular them with the Byre... possibly with good reason...

Finally, Siemens aren't the only maker of good tubes...

I have reviewed the M4 console and I believe it is scheduled for the December issue of SOS.

Hugh

---

I look forward to reading that review Hugh.

I think my feelings on the TL M range have been noted before.

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Samplecraze
Stretch That Note

Quote Tomás Mulcahy:

---

I dunno... my 9:4:2 Amek BCII has exactly the same OTT PSU as all Amek desks, it's a 2U rack that weighs only slightly less than the desk... runs very cool without the fan...

---

As you say, Amek supplied the same power supply as you have with their biggest desks too where it was woefully inadequate and a major problem.

Power supplies are one of the most stressed parts in any console and are almost certainly going to be one of the major sources of problems (aside from noisy pots and switches).

Cheers

James.

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JRP Music - Audio Mastering and Restoration.
http://www.jrpmusic.net

Edited by James Perrett (21/10/05 09:42 AM)

Quote Hugh Robjohns:

---

'Inadequate PSUs with British consoles' is a very popular theme with the Byre... possibly with good reason...

---

Yep! Many British desks have a reputation in Germany (and elsewhere) for having poor power supplies and for being unreliable.

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www.the-byre.com No longer Forum Member

Interesting comments on Amek power supplies...

they are NOT all the same... not by a VERY long way.

I'm sitting a dozen feet and 2 walls away from 2 fancooled 4U 2000 series PSU's that supply my desk, and I have technical and service schematics for several OTHER different models....

some installations were under spec, but AFAIK, that's often because the user was too tight to buy and install the number of PSU's recommended, and had the consoles wired for less. this applies to most of the large format manufacturers....

mind you, it would help if the manufacturers hadn't priced the power supplies in line with a small house, and over specc'ed their "std recommendations" by say 30% ....
and at several thousand quid a shot... whilst arguably a good longevity move, not necessarily the most economically attractive one I've ever seen. you'd have the sales guy saying, you needed say 4 PSU's , when you actually needed 3, but because you didn't trust them, you only ordered 2.

crazy.....


back on Topic.

the TLA VTC console does the TLA sound very well... but god help you if you want a more neutral "Clean" sound....

personally I feel the should stick to small "submixers " like the M3, and outboard. even then some of it is an acquired taste.... however, some of it i REALLY like.,...

(Specifically, their old Indigo series Compressors, EQ and Mic pre's , which are all discontinued, although in some form, may partly live on in the "classic " blue range)

then you can just add however much you want of it, in a controlled fashion....


Max

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if you don't know who i am, i aint gonna tell you.

The PSU issue is an interesting one, and the idea that purchasers are underspecifying their desks deos seem a likely cause. The majorty of my experience of SSLs, Neves, Ameks, Calrecs and other consoles has been very good. In fact, I can only think of one power supply failure issue -- but these were all desks in broadcast installations and most had dual redundant supplies in typical broadcast fashion.

If looking to buy a large format desk, it may well be sensible to ask about power supply ratings, switch on surges and reliability... but I'd be very wary of making purchasing decisions based on Internet forum hearsay.

hugh

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Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

Quote Hugh Robjohns:

---

The PSU issue is an interesting one, and the idea that purchasers are underspecifying their desks deos seem a likely cause.

---

You're telling me customers go to SSL, Amek, et al and say, "Please don't supply this desk with the recommended PSU, go down one model to save a couple of thousand pounds!"

I have never heard of anyone except broadcasters specifying the power supply. One of the reasons one goes to an SSL, Neve, Calrec etc., is so that these silly issues dissapear. One of the problems has been a tendancy by some to buy in their PSUs and it never seems to be the engineers who make these decisions, but some dweeb with an HNC in telephoning.

You know those purchasing clerks that say "How much is that thing rated at? One thousand Watts? Well, I'll get a one thousand Watt power supply, then! Oh no! It's two thousand Watts, well I'll need two of them then!"

The story I was telling was about two dance producers in Germany. You cannot expect them to know how to spec up a studio desk any more than you would know how to spec the gearbox or the universal joints on your car. These people are music majors, not technicians. They assumed, somewhat foolishly, that when they bought a desk, it would be a desk that works - and not a desk that fails. They could not have given a damn why or how it failed, it just failed.

If you were designing a mobile, you would not say that you wannted an MAN gearbox, you would just say, "I'll get a Scania or Mercedes truck as they don't break down and I'll keep away from Renault trucks as they shed gearboxes. Therefore Scania and Mercedes are good trucks and Renault are bad trucks."

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www.the-byre.com No longer Forum Member

So if they are not techies, what do a couple of German Dance Producers know about music then?



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Jack of all trades, master of some.

Quote Max The Mac:

---

Interesting comments on Amek power supplies...

they are NOT all the same... not by a VERY long way.

I'm sitting a dozen feet and 2 walls away from 2 fancooled 4U 2000 series PSU's that supply my desk, and I have technical and service schematics for several OTHER different models....

some installations were under spec, but AFAIK, that's often because the user was too tight to buy and install the number of PSU's recommended, and had the consoles wired for less. this applies to most of the large format manufacturers....

mind you, it would help if the manufacturers hadn't priced the power supplies in line with a small house, and over specc'ed their "std recommendations" by say 30% ....
and at several thousand quid a shot... whilst arguably a good longevity move, not necessarily the most economically attractive one I've ever seen. you'd have the sales guy saying, you needed say 4 PSU's , when you actually needed 3, but because you didn't trust them, you only ordered 2.

crazy.....


back on Topic.

the TLA VTC console does the TLA sound very well... but god help you if you want a more neutral "Clean" sound....

personally I feel the should stick to small "submixers " like the M3, and outboard. even then some of it is an acquired taste.... however, some of it i REALLY like.,...

(Specifically, their old Indigo series Compressors, EQ and Mic pre's , which are all discontinued, although in some form, may partly live on in the "classic " blue range)

then you can just add however much you want of it, in a controlled fashion....


Max

---

I can only agree with you re the Indigo series, as we both have talked about this and own a couple of the C2021s.

Others will argue for the Ivory series in addition to the Indigos, not me though. Not saying they are bad, just not on the Indigo level.

However, the VTC has other failings apart from the actual colouration and the same applies to earlier generations of the M series.

The V1L was a half decent product but only when modded with different valves.

I will, of course, reserve judgement until I read Hugh's review.
This new M might be exactly what the doctor ordered.

Apart from the sound, I am interested to see how well it integrates into an existing system and how adaptable it is, failings that existed with former models.

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Samplecraze
Stretch That Note

Quote Hugh Robjohns:

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... but I'd be very wary of making purchasing decisions based on Internet forum hearsay.

hugh

---

Good point!!

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madtheory creations
Synths and pianos for Kontakt

Quote The Byre:

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You're telling me customers go to SSL, Amek, et al and say, "Please don't supply this desk with the recommended PSU, go down one model to save a couple of thousand pounds!"

---

in not so many words.... pretty much...although often not quite as directly as that

it's not penny ante money either.... I've seen some PSU's with prices approaching £10K , in my experience though, it more often kind of happens like....

Originally they Spec a 60 input desk with a producer desk section... and on board RHS patchbay and the required minimum PSU, with no redundant supply or overlap. which is installed... and is operationally fine... (although short sighted in my opinion... )

then a year or two later replace the producer desk section with an extra 12 input strips, but not spend the @£9000 + VAT for an extra supply... and just run the additional cabling from one of the other power looms.

at a cost of nearly 10 grand ex vat, in some cases , you're damn right the "clerk" or A.N.Other person who isn't an electrical or technical audio engineer, figures they can get away with it....

till they get the bill for rewiring the console after the third PSU failure,. when someone else finally gets asked to look at why their Console keeps blowing ONE of the PSU's but the others are fine!

one suspects if penny pincher hadn't already left, they shortly did afterwards.

scarily it's not a unique scenario.... especially when people in more recent past buy desks used .........

it can get very scary.... I know of One Neve installation that blows a PSU out if you put the recommended earth links across between PSU Main and Audio Earth.

I did fervently suggest it get "fixed properly" after having had "fun" tracing a fault with talkback signals being ludicrously noisy.... and discovering this during the process as a side issue.....
The noisy talkback mic issue was finally traced to the Neve as well....

At Eddie, yes mate, I quite agree..... on all points...


Max

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if you don't know who i am, i aint gonna tell you.

Actually, what IS this thing with PSUs? Whilst I have had no major problems (yet) with my Audient - which both Jack and Max in this thread know and have used - I have so far this year had to replace the fuse in the mains plug no less than four times, really for no apparent reason I can establish.

It's a little bit unnerving when you have six paying punters in the studio (this week being a case in point)!

--------------------
Dynamite with a laser beam...

buy fuses in bulk and keep them nearby... keep some in the boot of your car too...

ahhh, yes, the Audient PSU fuse...

the Audient PSU (in common with many other designs) has a significant In-rush current , which can occasionally blow the normal fuse... or trip an RCD.

It's not a "fault" as such, it's better to have the safety factor of a fuse that can occasionally be overwhelmed, than a fuse which never blows, as that will give inadequate protection in the event of a fault....

Jack's Audient regularly trips the RCD circuit breaker.... for exactly the same reason.

they ALL do that one way or another.... it's largely an unfortunate coincidence with the Current load happening to be "just in the wrong place" with regards to fuse ratings....

Max

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if you don't know who i am, i aint gonna tell you.

Quote Zukan:

---

Apart from the sound, I am interested to see how well it integrates into an existing system and how adaptable it is, failings that existed with former models.

---

It is essentially an overgrown M3 -- the front end is very similar, but with slightly extended facilities, and provides the same 'tube sauce on everything' sound quality.

For me, the disappointment was the output side of it. In my opinion, very limited and restrictive facilities here that would make it hard to use as an all-in-one console.

Hugh

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Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

The whole thinking behind your posting Max is just plain wrong. If the PSU is genuinely strong enough for a 60-frame, then it is strong enough for a 72 frame.

Roughly speaking, a 60-frame uses about 1kW, some more some less, but it is about there. That means that the main power rail has to carry 30 amps if it is running +/- 15 to 18 volts. So that means that the PSU should be getting a total nose bleed at 60 amps. But most UK desks put only slightly more than is required, maybe 40 or 45 amps at the most, but that's it. Woefully inadequate! Also they buy universal PSUs and just turn a pot to get the right voltages and have the things sprayed in their colours.

The adult way to make PSUs is to get one big transformer for the main rail and lesser beasts for the logic stuff and the 48 volt rail. Transformers are cheap! They do not cost thousands, they cost hundreds if they are really big and really good. The same goes for big, hairy industrial strength rectifiers, diodes and capacitors. All that regulation circuitry is bollocks, sheer bollocks. If the thing is made to double capacity, it will not need all that guff. And the customer will be able to add a 12 channel sidebar without the PSU even breaking a sweat on a hot day.

Add to all that two power cables, a big metal box with cooling fans to take all that and you are in business. That's how power supplies were built before there were such things as off-the-shelf PSUs and they worked better.

Steve has to replace the fuses because the thing probably (for no good reason that I can think of) has a ring (T) transformer, so every time it is switched on, for the first few milliseconds it is just one huge short circuit.

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www.the-byre.com No longer Forum Member

Andy, I suggest you give up the studio business and move into console PSU design. You're clearly better equipped to do so than the engineers paid to do the job.

Spouting personal opinion and half-knowledge dressed up as facts is not particularly helpful or constructive!

hugh

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Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

Quote Hugh Robjohns:

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Spouting personal opinion and half-knowledge dressed up as facts is not particularly helpful or constructive!

---

Now, now, Hugh! Calm down!

There is nothing wrong with keeping it simple. Simple = reliable and in a small PSU that is all that counts.

A PSU has transformers, a rectifier or two, some capacitors and Z diodes. It also needs some cooling for the rectifiers and a fuse or two scattered here and there in case something goes wrong. If you want to get sophisticated, you could add metering to tell the user how much power and-or current is being drawn. But that's it.

We are talking about supplying a hand-full of voltages to a device that only ever draws its current within a very small range. This is not a DC supply to some critical motors that pull rods up and down in a nuclear power plant, but a thing that just sits there and uses more or less the same (relatively small) amount of current day in and day out.

I have spoken to several 'desk people' on this subject and 'as a man' they tell me that they were instructed to out-source the manufacture of as many parts of the desks (and anything else they made) as possible. Whereas before they would have a metal shop for frames and stands, a paint and print shop and a geezer building PSUs, these items were built elsewhere and were usually off-the-shelf. This meant that the manufacturer freed up capital, but it also meant that the individual item became laughably expensive and getting something made to specific requirements became almost impossible. That's where the £10,000 PSUs and £6,000 patchbays come from.

I spent two years of my life building desks and we did everything in-house. And I do mean everything. We had a screen printer, a UV cabinet, a CNC machine to cut the strip plates and drill the holes, a wood shop with format-table-saw for hand rails, tops and sides and things and of course a welding shop for frames and stands. The only thing we did not do was wind the power transformers because Guenther up the road had a trafo-winding shop and we bought in Siemens audio transformers for the inputs.

The largest desk we built was, if my memory serves me rightly a 56-frame with 2" strips and the usual patch-bay, monitor section, bla, bla. The customer could have any configuration. Literally any. 12dB eq, 18dB eq, one, two, three parametrics, VU metering, peak meters, odd number of channels. XLR on the back, Hartings and XLR on the back, Hartings and patch-bay only. In buckets, in one big lump, whatever. You know, the way it used to be before the marketing boys took over.

Because we were just a handful of people and only three of us worked full time (myself, crazy Ralf who came to work in underpants and V from the infamous mobile recording featuring Petra, a bucket, a piano, an A60, two 441s, a trestle table and a pair of binoculars) it was inevitable that one got a good idea of the problems involved with every step of manufacture. And yes, I did build power supply units, lots of them!

Of course they did not spark alpha-beam charge-centres and they did not telephone their Aunt in Maryland to report that a voltage had drifted from 17.8 to 17.3V and they were not made out of off-the-shelf units bolted together. They were bog-simple and bloody big.

I went on to build amps, crossovers and speakers and these too were bog-simple and bloody big. To be honest, one of the reasons I made them simple was because I did not have the know-how to make them complicated. But those that I know of are still working today.

Having done God-knows how many thousands of PAs, mobiles, studio sessions and all bits in between, I can assure you that audio equipment has to be one thing above all other things, no matter what - and that is reliable. A features list as long as your arm is of no use if it doesn't work. A THD spec with more noughts than you can point a stick at is pointless if you can't hear anything. A dream signal to noise ratio is bloody silly if it is not making any noise at all.

A mixing desk makes very simple demands on the power supply. It just says "Could you please provide me with these few DC voltages at these currents and don't drift or do anything silly and no Gremlins please."

It doesn't vary by much, or flicker on and off or suddenly become a generator the way so may industrial applications do. It just sits there and asks for three square meals a day and the colour supplement on Sundays. All it wants is to be safe in the knowledge that each meal is available in double portions. Just in case. And that means that the PSU has to be bog-simple and bloody big.

A final thought on fancy power supplies:

Q: How many audio engineers does it take to change a light bulb?

A: None. - I just don't understand it. It ought to be working!

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www.the-byre.com No longer Forum Member

and in all this time you've never come across the installation of multiple PSU's to feed a console system instead of one big one???? and I don't mean redundant fast switched back ups... i mean multiple units feeding sections of console to divide load .

my what a fortunate and sheltered life you've led......

the point being that building 2-3KW supplies and spreading the load is often considered to be a better idea than building a single 6 KW device.. It would have to depend on circumstance as to whether I think that's the best way to do it or not....

it's not my thinking Andy, it's my direct experience of reality. in multiple installations from multiple manufacturers. especially when you start talking about large format modular designs... with process mainframe and control surface being separate units.
and loads can and DO vary...

I don;t disagree with you about reliability, or that PSU's SHOULD be bullet proof and built like a Tank.,,, or that simplicity is a very desirable thing

I merely gave an example, based on factual experience, of how some of the "reliability" issues come about, and not necessarily always as a result of manufacturing incompetence..



Max

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if you don't know who i am, i aint gonna tell you.

Some interesting points,

I've got an M3. It does some things very well and others not so well.

The 'tube sound' of the drive is quite apparent and I use it as an effect quite often. As a summing box, In comparative tests, I get slightly more 'pleasing' bottom end definition as opposed to mixing ITB; That said, were not talking about the night and day difference as in the case of an SSL or comparative console.

The eq has a lot of character which again can be great, but also sometimes exactly what you don't want.

One negative I have noticed is the inconistancy beteen the channels, its subtle but not quite right.

Overall I would say for the price its a good tool. It is perhaps a one trick pony and is quite characterful. It certainly would be of benefit to dance bunnies and hip hop heads wanting to give there mixes a bit of anologue colouration. But from a high end perspective I wouldn't really say its stands up against ssl, neve etc. But for the price why would you expect it to I guess.

Quote Max The Mac:

---

I'm sitting a dozen feet and 2 walls away from 2 fancooled 4U 2000 series PSU's that supply my desk, and I have technical and service schematics for several OTHER different models....
Max

---

Out of curiosoty, if you bought the most well specified components available and had a good electrical engineer assemble a facimile of these designs, do you think that this (heavy duty) power supply would cost as much as the figures quoted (eg 9 grand) in this thread ?

I totally accept that R & D is a factor in the price of equipment, which is why you can build a clone of something for 1/6 - 1/10 the cost of the real thing (as some unreputable budget manufacurers seem to have) (plus, you know that if you don't build it yourself but buy it ready made, it will work when you plug it in ...), but I really thought that the science of power supplies was quite well established - transformer, rectifier, voltage regulator, filtering ...

As a comparison, I'm building a PSU for some rack gear that will supply a pre-amp I'm also building, and the transformer (+/- 15V, 30 VA), voltage regulators and capacitors etc will have cost less than the rack box to house it. I know that this is not nearly enough balls to run a desk, but after hearing that you'd need multiple 9 grand PSUs I'm still trying to pick the bits of my jaw up from the floor !!

No Johnny, i really don't think the PSU should cost that much... I just happen to know that SOME do.... a scary example of AMS-Neve pricing that particular one was

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if you don't know who i am, i aint gonna tell you.

Before I get down and dirty, let me - right up front - state that British desks are the best in the World. That is a statement of opinion, but (this time!) it is not my opinion, but the opinion of the market place. From Nashville to Nuerenberg, from Berlin to Beijing, from Tokyo to Toronto, the chances are, if you walk into a large or even mid-sized studio, you will see a British desk. The mics are nearly always German, the effects are mostly American, but the desk is probably British.

(Sony Studios in Tokyo could of course have had an Oxford mixing desk for nothing - but instead they paid for a mixing desk from Oxford!)

But I shall deal with your comments first and come back to all that later:

Quote Max The Mac:

---

and in all this time you've never come across the installation of multiple PSU's to feed a console system instead of one big one???? and I don't mean redundant fast switched back ups... i mean multiple units feeding sections of console to divide load.

---

err, I own one.

Though I have to admit that after a rectifier blew, I opened up one of the power supplies to find that it used poxy little plastic rectifiers. Because they were plastic and not cooled properly, they overheated and blew. I called a former service engineer from the manufacturer and he told me that they were ordered to buy them in like that and were not allowed to alter them. If it were not for the poxy rectifiers, each one of the PSUs could carry the desk easily (and then some). The caps and the transformers were well in excess of the power requirements of the desk, but in the name of out-sourcing and cost cutting, only the pick-and-place, assembly and QC were still done in-house.

Well, to cut a long story short, we rejigged both power supplies and now run the desk from one good PSU and have one good PSU as backup. We have left things like this for the past two years without incident.

Quote Max The Mac:

---

especially when you start talking about large format modular designs... with process mainframe and control surface being separate units.
and loads can and DO vary.

---

"process mainframe" sounds like digital to me and that is not what we were talking about. Analogue desks vary very little. I have not gone out and tested all the different desks, but my guess would be that they do not vary by more than 40%, if that.

Quote Max The Mac:

---

and not necessarily always as a result of manufacturing incompetence.

---

That all depends on what you call manufacturing. Let me give you an example:
I was talking to the CEO of an Indiana manufacturer of electrical motors with plant on every continent. This man said of one of his plant managers 'He really knows how to make electrical motors.'

Of course he did not mean that if you gave him some castings, bearings and lots of wire, he would be able to build a motor. This was a man with an MBA who would have come last in Scrap-Heap Challenge and is unlikely to have ever used a welder in anger. But he knew how to build motors - as a business.

What that CEO meant was that his plant manager understood how to take the resources provided by the mechanics of the open shares market and use them to produce electrical motors.

There are three common ways to run a business:

1. Public company issuing shares on the open market. I think of this as the American model because US companies tend to go for an IPO far earlier in their life cycles than do their European counterparts.

2. A partnership between practical expertise and business expertise. I think of this as the British model, as it is exemplified by companies like Rolls-Royce, where an engineer works with a businessman to bring a product to market.

3. A private company that belongs to one person, family or small group of private individuals. I think of this as the German model as it is exemplified by giant German companies like Aldi, Lidl and Bertelsmann.

And before anybody starts shouting and bawling, of course there are all three types in all countries and all types of mixed management models. I am just trying to simplify things to explain why the desk manufacturing industry is the way it is and why, instead of chunky metal boxes on wheels that last for ever, power supplies have turned into the 19" version of wall-warts that fail now and then.

Without wandering off too far from the question of PSUs and British desks, let me just state some very broad generalisations (that you may want to discuss, but then perhaps in the Business or better still Community sections of this forum):-

In the past few decades, i.e. after the War, the American model (public company) has proven itself to be the most successful in terms of growth, longevity and profit. This is largely because its ownership (as well as its trading activities) is subject to the discipline of the market place. This model allows for growth better than the other two.

The German model makes growth difficult, but as long as the owner does not burden the company with debt or dilute the ownership through mergers and partial stock issues, this model will weather a crisis better than the others.

The British model of a partnership worked well in some industries during the Victorian and post Victorian age up to WW2, but has proven very unsuccessful since then. The successful old partnerships became public companies like Daimler and Benz and some merged and swallowed up parts of the competition, so Armstrong and Siddeley became Armstrong-Siddeley, which became Hawker-Siddeley, which became British Aerospace.

(If you have read this far, you are probably wondering what the bloody hell any of this has got to do with PSUs and the answer is everything.)

The British studio mixing desk industry is tiny and is built largely on the unsuccessful partnership model. It was centred around the engineering know how of a hand full, (well, a bit more than a hand full, more like a few dozen) engineers with brilliant and innovative ideas. Some of them may have been inspired by American desks, but once they understood what it was that they had to build, they excelled.

Of course there was allot of crap produced, but even products like Canary and MM (which really did stand for Mickey Mouse!) taught us that there was a huge market for cheaper products. But without risking litigation, let's just say that ideas that I remember seeing for the first time in British desks like the old black Soundcrafts seem to have found their way into desks made in Shanghai.

And it was not just the studio desks, A&H, Soundcraft, Calrec, Midas and plenty more that I have forgotten dominated other market sectors like broadcast and PA. But here they survived, either as part of larger groups, or they reached critical mass and were large enough to fight their corner.

But when the mainframe studio market stopped expanding and then even began to contract, just about every builder of studio desks staggered from one totally unworkable business model to another. Bankruptcies and receiverships abounded and famous names disappeared, only to reappear under yet another misconceived business partnership. When the big two, SSL and AMS-Neve were spun off into management buy-outs, there were hopelessly under-funded and more importantly, they did not have the management know-how to cope with the ProTools revolution.

(In my opinion they had the right products, but they were marketing in all the wrong ways and definitely banging on all the wrong doors. World-wide there are perhaps 200 customers that want or need a new large studio desk for tracking music at the £250,000+ level. The K-Series and the 88R series have sold about 70 each from what I have heard and the Amek 9098i sold about 20.)

When you are having the very life squeezed out of you and your core market of large studios is dying on its feet, when the old faces no longer show up at your stand at the AES and the music market is dominated by people who have never even heard of the AES, what do you do? You do the only thing left, you start firing your staff, starting with the metal shop, then the paint and print shop. As things get worse and worse, they have to leave one by one. The crazy dude on the forklift that started with you as a kid back in the 70's, old Crusty that always managed to solve all your mechanical problems like how to make things fit even when they didn't. Old Angus that actually could smell a dodgy transformer long before it blew - they got that little bit hotter and as the lacquer of the windings heated up, he sniffed and knew not to use that one, yes old Angus in the PSU shop, he had to go too.

In future, we'll just buy them in and badge them.

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