I’ve just bought a Universal Audio Volt 276 audio interface and I love it. A lot. In my years of working with analogue mixers I always added a little compression to vocals and acoustic instruments before they enter the input. Having switched to DAW “in the box” recording I found that using a plugin doesn’t really give ideal results. So I went looking for a solution and the Volt 276 seems to be it.
I have a Focusrite 2i2 interface which I really like but it’s just a straight ahead, good quality in and out router with decent mic preamps. What I wanted was a hardware compressor. There are plenty of good ones around but the problem is that they don’t work with Condenser mics which use Phantom power. You need a mic preamp for that. So it looked like I’d need to buy 2 items to satisfy my needs.
A Great Two For One Solution
Not a problem – there are plenty of both on the market which fit a home studio budget. But during my research I found the Volt and a number of its competitors that offered an all in one solution. What eventually drew me to the Universal Audio Volt 276 Interface was
- Includes analog circuitry from UA’s legendary 610 tube preamp and 1176 compressor
- Looks ace
- Comes with some useful free software and plugins including Melodyne, Ujam virtual drummer and a plugin version of Relab’s vintage reverb
It’s a little more expensive than some of its competitors but probably a little cheaper than buying sperate components. I read and watched a number of reviews on the 276 before buying. I did find some negative comments but overall I was swayed by the likes of Warren Huart (Produce like a Pro) who rated it well.
With simplicity in mind, UA have provided 3 presets for the compressor stage: Vocals, Guitar and Fast. As the setting suggest these are based on standard setting used on the 1176 for those sounds. The preamp effect is labelled Vintage and is an on or off affair.
In The Footsteps Of Giants…
We need to remeber that Univeral Audio’s 1176 compressor is a £2500 piece of kit and the 610 preamp’s equivalent is £2000. Clearly the 276 is not going to provide the same quality at a fraction of the price (and size) but can it give us a taste?
Well, its early days but I’m pretty chuffed with the results I’ve had so far. I’m in the process of acoutic treating my vocal recording room and about half way there. It’s certainly a lot less ‘verby already so a good place to test the 276 out.
My partner Mo recorded a dozen or so vocal takes using our SE2200A large diagphram condenser mic through the Volt. I set Vintage to on and selected the Vocal compressor preset. The first thing I noticed was that this adds a fair chunk of gain so that had to be backed off a little. That done I could tell that Mo was getting a good headphone experience in there. I added one of the included Relab reverb plugin’s on a bus so that she could hear that as she tracked.
Posh Sound – Great Freebies
On listeneing to the recoded tracks I was pretty impressed. With the singing of course but also what the Volt 276 and the Relab reverb had done. I can best describe the effect as sounding expensive. The units these are based around have been used on countless hit songs and you can see why.
At the risk of sounding a bit “chefy”, there’s a richness to the sound from the vintage preamp and the compression is big and full. Even before adding further compression or double tracking Mo’s vocals were sitting nicely in the mix. The Relab LX480 reverb (I used one of the Joe Carrell presets) was also lovely. Some of the Logic Pro verbs are amazing but this is very impressive.
All in all I’d say that the Universal Audio Volt 276 audio interface is box of tricks well worth considering. Especially if, like me you are looking for a way to add a little tuning to a signal before it is recorded. I realise some people don’t habitually do this but many producers do. The one thing that may become a drag is that there is no way to balance the DAW audio with the inputs as you can with the Focusrite. This just means you have to adjust your project’s level rather than having a handy dial on the interface. No bigge for me so far.
You’ll get a lovely looking box that sits well on your desk, a definite touch of class on your recordings and a bunch of handy free software. What’s not to like?
