Warm Audio Tone Beast Mic Preamp - Line Input

The Warm Audio Tonebeast is a discrete opamp-based microphone preamp. It expands on their original API-based WA13 preamp. I captured the Tonebeast in its Line input as a mix tool for in-line saturation. As I increased the preamp’s Gain, I compensated the Output to retain unity gain. I used low level signals to calibrate levels. The Tonebeast was set at the following Gain levels: 0dB - Unity Gain, subtle color 20dB - My recommendation for some obvious saturation 30dB - More saturation 40dB - Cranked; crackly clipping My advice: -These work as intended on the Gateway plugin with the Raw output. Further ingestion on my part needs to be done to figure out how to get the captures to translate to the TONE3000 plugin’s handling of output normalization. -Input calibration is not needed since I captured them at unity gain. Since input calibration is not needed, again the Raw output is recommended. -Turn the Gate off in the NAM plugin. -For the most obvious changes, just switch between the four Gain levels. The other options are more for a deep dive into hearing component differences. I wanted to see if NAM could capture the nuances between the switchable components of the Tonebeast. -Upgraded Opamps: CAPI CA-0252 (API-style) vs John Hardy 990C+ (“Clean and Punchy”) -Tantalum (Vintage) vs Electrolytic (Clean) Capacitors -Steel (St) vs Nickel (Ni) Output Transformer These are all subtle options that I probably can’t reliably identify in a blind test. I do think the slight differences of components can be heard at +40dB gain on a Kick Drum’s attack and decay. The capture that should have the most “vintage color” should be: “WA Tonebeast 40dB CAPI Vint St.nam” The file name indicates the following: 40dB gain, CAPI CA-0252 Opamp, Tanatulum capacitors in Vintage Mode, Steel output transformer The Tonebeast's Tone switch was engaged on all captures. Signal Chain: RME UCX II Out (19dBu Send) - Tonebeast - RME UCX II In (19dBu Return) I decided to use the standard sweep signal since more NAM plugins now implement oversampling.