Having used many rack pre amps in the studio I found that the Audient ASP008 at an obvious level saved us space in the rack and looks really good with its brushed sliver face plate and bright shiny knobs it is easy to get your hands on.
However the 8 mic pres soon showed its real sound worth. At only a quarter of the price of some similar 2 & 4 channel mic pres the Audient's quality is one to reckon with. Each of the eight channels features a gain control and a variable high pass filter that ranges from 25hz to 250 Hz with a 12db/octave slope. Illuminated push-buttons select HPF, phase reverse and line/mic selection available on all eight channels with instrument DI selection on channels 1 & 2 very handy to just jack in and play in the control room.
The peak LEDs on each channel offer a great visual metering advantage when you're hot in the recoding process along with the variable mic impedance switches on each channel. At the back its nice and easy to hook up with XLR inputs from your liveroom, desk or other out board. We run d-sub out to our Apogee's but the ASP008 can be run as a front end to your DAW or multi-track recorder with a space for digital interfaces cards to slot in.
The sound quality of the ASP008 is very open and direct and we have got some great results both in studio and live. Having so many options at your disposal you can achieve great results with easy to use pot and switch controls which are quite close together on the front panel so fat fingers may have a problem, but it’s a small problem for the price and amount of channels that can fit snug in your rack. The ASP008 is up there with some of the best in the field at an affordable price. It’s a very handy unit.
Independent review by Warren Tivy, engineer at Claycastle recording studio Youghal co cork Ireland
http://www.claycastlemusic.com/