Page 2: Alice 828 Mk3

Preamps

The preamp inputs are transformer balanced, but they’re incredibly neutral: at reasonable input levels, I couldn’t tell the difference on most sources between these and my Benchmark MP1, which, like most Benchmark products, was engineered to be as technically perfect and linear as possible. The mic preamp’s EIN figure looks good at ‑128dB with a 200Ω input, but note that it’s measured with 70dB gain (not that the preamp can deliver that on its own!) which is non‑standard and inflates the EIN figure!

Looking closely at the recorded waveforms to compare what I’d recorded with the Alice and Benchmark preamps, I could see a tiny amount of transient compression in the Alice, but it wasn’t audible. Winding the levels up, the Benchmark remained flat, whereas the 828 Mk3 began to introduce character; a pleasing effect to my ears, though when pushing this too far the signal started to distort. On the cusp of distortion, there’s a nice area where the preamp seems to be working hard, but not obviously distorting, and this can be great for giving a little natural ‘drive’ to a source. Keeping things lower, though, it’s as flat as you’ll ever need. There’s also the option of feeding ‘hot’ levels into the preamp, should you want to ‘push’ the input transformers.

The obligatory rear‑panel shot: two of the 828 Mk3’s five stereo channels offer the additional option of RIAA‑compensated RCA phono inputs, for hooking up vinyl turntables.

Baxandall-style EQ

On the original 828, the EQ would have been used while recording or mixing live broadcast material. Today, you’re less likely to need to EQ while recording, but you can definitely use this EQ to tweak the balance when summing to stereo or, along with the mono channels’ transformers and preamps, as external plug‑ins in your DAW. The EQs aren’t brimming with character but neither are they totally benign: Ted has long used the same Baxandall‑style EQ design in his desks, and it’s an eminently usable musical‑sounding circuit that I’ve always found simple and forgiving. It’s definitely preferable to fiddling with a full parametric’s controls in most situations!

The LF shelf EQ has a nominal turnover at 60Hz, and the midrange control covers 700Hz to 4kHz, with a Q of around 1.4. There’s also a 10kHz HF shelf, and all three bands have a ±15dB range. The LF shelf and midrange are well judged, but musical tastes change with time, and a 10kHz treble band may be considered a little low in frequency for some modern styles. Still, where I particularly wanted a higher high shelf, I was happy turning to software or a different EQ, and this one works well most of the time.

My only real gripe about the EQs was the lack of them on the stereo channels. As this addition would make the 828 Mk3 much more useful for the sort of processing and summing I like to do, I asked Ted if a customer could have such a mod made, and I was told I could have any modification I wanted priced up, right up to input and output transformers on any channel and a full set of EQs. That’s quite something in terms of personal service, and with that many transformers and EQs and 12 channels in a box, it could be a formidable tool.

Sonic Character

This desk can, of course, be used as a good, clean‑sounding, practical mixer — if you’re looking for a high‑quality analogue desk that sounds relatively benign, the 828 Mk3 is worth considering. But, other than for the recording side of things, you can stay in the box for that, and my own favourite use for an analogue desk these days is to route stems and busses out of the box, through the desk for some character, and back in again. A great way to process stems on a desk like the 828 Mk3 is to push tracks into the master bus at a high level and encourage the output transformers to impart some character, though you can try overloading the channel input transformers too, or driving the discrete mic amps.

I’ve routed plenty of audio through this desk throughout the review period and, to my surprise, I particularly enjoyed using it with electronic music. In order to make some audio examples for this review, I took a snappy drum and bass loop I’d made, and sent the left and right master into two of the mono channels in line mode, and pushed the output as hard as I could to get some ‘saturation’. For the mono channels, the input transformers are always in the signal path, whether in mic or line mode, but I suspect it’s overloading the discrete mic amps that adds a beautifully big ‘squash’ to the sound when you drive these channels hard!

The output transformers are, as I’d expected, a more subtle affair but, combined with overloading the input transformers, you can access all the warmth and bounce you’d expect. The transformer saturation creates a nice, familiar ‘rounding’ of the sound, with a rich distortion kicking in as you push the levels into overcooked territory. There are plenty of creative uses here as well as more standard tone‑shaping ones.

Limiter

Although the 828 Mk3’s master‑bus diode limiter, which has a broadly 12:1 ratio, was designed primarily for overload protection, its limiter isn’t and can’t be left‑right linked, which is as it should be for a protective limiter. Its Threshold control is numbered 1 to 10, with 10 being the lowest threshold.

While this limiter isn’t really intended for creative use, that wasn’t going to stop me! It has a fast, snappy and transparent characteristic, and can clamp down hard, yet manages to maintain the transient feel and attack. In fact, transients could sound so ‘present’ that on some occasions I used Oeksound Spiff to tame them before routing them to the desk. Out of curiosity, I compared it with a TG12413 Zener Limiter clone as well as some plug‑ins. Compared with the TG12413 clone, the Alice sounded a little sharper, crisper and more ‘lean’; the TG12413 blurred transients more and sounded generally softer and rounder. Even in limit mode, with the hold controls nearly at maximum and an 80Hz side‑chain filter, it never managed the same snap as the Alice. Comparing the limiter to a few plug‑ins, it exhibited the characteristic I love about hardware compression, the transients just seemed far more snappy, lively and present than with most of the software.

All of which means this limiter is something of a hidden gem. It’s great on electronic music. Although techno, hip‑hop and other electronic producers may not immediately think of a British analogue desk as a first choice for a master limiter, they’d be missing out if they dismissed this, as it’s great for electronic music — you can throw loud kick drums and so on at it and have the mix come out the other end with a nice, bouncy, lively sound.

Conclusion

The 828 Mk3 wears its broadcast origins on its sleeve, with some seemingly anachronistic but charming quirks and features carried over from the earlier models. Really, it’s a case of “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Ted has taken a timeless design and added a handful of more modern features that make it even more solid than before. For example, the main failure points of the original consoles, namely the carbon‑track pots and faders, have been replaced with conductive plastic versions, which should outlast the originals. But while construction has been updated for reliability, he hasn’t done anything to sacrifice the original sound characteristics or the simplicity and spaciousness of the layout, which remains a real selling point — desktop mixers should not be the preserve of the tiny handed!

Analogue gear is an investment, and equipment that can be maintained and repaired well into the future strikes me as a much safer place to put my money!

For my own use, while I love the desk overall, the off‑the‑peg model lacks a few features. I’d like to have EQs and input transformers on all the stereo channels, so stems and mono channels can be treated to input transformer saturation and creative EQ, before going back into the box. I’d also like a balanced monitor output, and, ideally, a switch so I can listen to the effect of the output transformers.

Thankfully, then, Ted’s old‑school‑in‑a‑good‑way attitude means you can request customisations — you could specify anything you could reasonably want that can fit in the chassis, from a full complement of input and output transformers for every channel, to additional EQs, custom colours, you name it. All this would no doubt add significant expense to the mixer, but it would make it incredibly powerful for the footprint.

If you’ve caught the analogue bug, and love the idea of equipment that will work for years to come, whether your computer is there or not, the 828 Mk3 offers a simple and compact way to mix at high quality. It’s a characterful and unique thing. There are a few quirks, such as the unbalanced monitor out and stereo inputs, but they’re not insurmountable problems and you can specify mods. The price isn’t low, but shouldn’t be: three channels of transformer‑balanced preamp and EQ could easily set you back more, and there are plenty of high‑quality summing mixers that cost rather more.

Ted once ran a company called Joe Meek, named after the famous yet troubled producer to whom the saying “If it sounds good, it is good” has been attributed. The 828 Mk3 sounds good and it is good.