Manley CORE is a 2U valve channel strip combining four circuits from the company catalogue: a Class-A microphone preamplifier, an ELOP optical compressor, a three band Baxandall equaliser and a FET limiter.
A whole tracking chain in two rack spaces
Capturing a vocal usually takes four devices and three sets of cables. The CORE closes that into one chassis, with a hand-wound Manley IRON input transformer at 1200 Ohm and Class-A valve stages. The ELOP compressor works at 3:1 with up to 16 dB of reduction, attack adjustable from 60 to 5 ms and release from 1.5 s to 100 ms. The FET limiter sits at the end as insurance against the peak an optical cell will not catch in time.
A Baxandall equaliser, not a parametric
The equalisation section carries high and low shelves plus a sweepable midrange, with up to 10 dB of range. A Baxandall circuit produces gentle, broad curves, exactly what tracking calls for when you want to set a tone rather than carve out resonances. A TRS insert point between the preamp and compressor sections and the equaliser lets you patch an external device into the middle of the chain. The illuminated VU meter switches between the direct output, the main output and gain reduction.
KEY FEATURES
- 2U valve channel strip with four sections
- Hand-wound Manley IRON input transformer at 1200 Ohm
- Microphone gain of 40 or 60 dB, line gain of 20 or 40 dB
- ELOP optical compressor at 3:1 with up to 16 dB of reduction
- Attack from 60 to 5 ms, release from 1.5 s to 100 ms
- Three band Baxandall equaliser with up to 10 dB of range
- High and low shelves plus a sweepable midrange
- FET brick wall limiter
- High pass filter from 120 Hz, 6 dB per octave
- TRS insert point in the middle of the chain
- Illuminated VU meter with selectable metering point
TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS
- Valves: 2 x 12AX7WA plus 1 x 6922
- Input impedance: 1200 Ohm mic, 10 kOhm line, 10 megohms DI
- Frequency response: 20 Hz to 20 kHz (±0.5 dB)
- THD and noise: below 0.1%, typically 0.02% at low gain
- Signal to noise ratio: better than 85 dB
- Dynamic range: better than 90 dB
- Maximum direct output: +35 dBu
- Maximum main output: +20 dBu
- Output impedance: 50 Ohm
- Dimensions: 19 x 3.5 x 7 inches, 2U; weight 8.3 lbs
- Power consumption: 35 W; mains 90 to 254 V