So I have a Presonus Bluetube, a 240$ (on amazon, right now) tube preamp. So a lot of you will probably say, "I know of Presonus as being a good brand, what's up?" Well, let me show you a couple pictures, and give a review/story on this PoS.
So in late April of this year, my friend who owns a music supply store came to me and said, "Hey, I got this preamp that came back right after it sold, can you check it out?"
So I contacted the customer before opening it, and I was told that it was making a horrendous, fast paced clicking noise, and channel 1 was no longer functional. So I opened it up and found that the main MC33079D chip for the output had literally gone up in flames.
Well, there's gotta be a reason for that, or it's just a defective chip. I proceeded to plug it in - literal worst idea I've had in awhile. Immediately the clicking noise came on, shit started smoking to I unplugged it immediately, what the fuck?
Well, the clicking noise to me sounded very 60HZ, not 120HZ like normal rectified unfiltered DC. So I proceeded to check the input rectifier, oh wait, there is no rectifier! There are 4 diodes for rectification, only problem is they are all single wave rectification, what the fuck?
So one of the diodes had failed short after only 6 days of use. Neat. I replaced the diode, then proceeded to go online and search for the IC that had fried. It's 8$ for 72 of them. I have a load of these if anyone wants some. So I got it, Louis Rossmann'd it (as the picture of my soldering clearly depicts). After that, Huzzah! It works... Except the customer decided to return it and get another unit from another brand. Great.
So I go into the shop, tell him it's fixed. He doesn't really know what to do, so he says, "Eh, happy birthday, keep it." It happened to be my bday, and I was shopping around for a unit like this at the time, the stars seemed to have aligned for me on that day.
Now, here's why I don't like this unit.
- The bulbs on the gauges have burned out. It's less than 6 months old.
- The tube inside is cheap, doesn't sound the best.
- The wall adapter gets too hot to touch most of the time, even when not being used.
- There is no on/off switch.
- I'm almost 100% sure the "Chang" brand caps in there are fakes, not real Chang. Nonetheless, why in a 200$ preamp, are there Chang caps, they couldn't even use something slightly better like Su'Scon or Ltec? Why are they not using Nichicon or some very good manufacturer?
- The input voltage regulation heatsink is separate from the one on the outside, not attached even by thermal glue. The fets/regulators don't get that hot though, so I guess that's fine?
However, as far as performance goes, it's fine. The sound quality could be better with a better tube, but it's fine as it is. My main peeve is the quality vs price, this should be built so much better for the price being paid.
In conclusion, fuck you, Presonus.
So in late April of this year, my friend who owns a music supply store came to me and said, "Hey, I got this preamp that came back right after it sold, can you check it out?"
So I contacted the customer before opening it, and I was told that it was making a horrendous, fast paced clicking noise, and channel 1 was no longer functional. So I opened it up and found that the main MC33079D chip for the output had literally gone up in flames.
Well, there's gotta be a reason for that, or it's just a defective chip. I proceeded to plug it in - literal worst idea I've had in awhile. Immediately the clicking noise came on, shit started smoking to I unplugged it immediately, what the fuck?
Well, the clicking noise to me sounded very 60HZ, not 120HZ like normal rectified unfiltered DC. So I proceeded to check the input rectifier, oh wait, there is no rectifier! There are 4 diodes for rectification, only problem is they are all single wave rectification, what the fuck?
So one of the diodes had failed short after only 6 days of use. Neat. I replaced the diode, then proceeded to go online and search for the IC that had fried. It's 8$ for 72 of them. I have a load of these if anyone wants some. So I got it, Louis Rossmann'd it (as the picture of my soldering clearly depicts). After that, Huzzah! It works... Except the customer decided to return it and get another unit from another brand. Great.
So I go into the shop, tell him it's fixed. He doesn't really know what to do, so he says, "Eh, happy birthday, keep it." It happened to be my bday, and I was shopping around for a unit like this at the time, the stars seemed to have aligned for me on that day.
Now, here's why I don't like this unit.
- The bulbs on the gauges have burned out. It's less than 6 months old.
- The tube inside is cheap, doesn't sound the best.
- The wall adapter gets too hot to touch most of the time, even when not being used.
- There is no on/off switch.
- I'm almost 100% sure the "Chang" brand caps in there are fakes, not real Chang. Nonetheless, why in a 200$ preamp, are there Chang caps, they couldn't even use something slightly better like Su'Scon or Ltec? Why are they not using Nichicon or some very good manufacturer?
- The input voltage regulation heatsink is separate from the one on the outside, not attached even by thermal glue. The fets/regulators don't get that hot though, so I guess that's fine?
However, as far as performance goes, it's fine. The sound quality could be better with a better tube, but it's fine as it is. My main peeve is the quality vs price, this should be built so much better for the price being paid.
In conclusion, fuck you, Presonus.
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