User Guide

Welcome!
Congratulations and thank you for choosing the MindPrint
®
DTC™
in your search for superior sonic results.
The MindPrint Dual Tube Channel signal processor combines two high-quality microphone
preamps, equalizers and compressor/limiters in one unit, giving you all the functionality of a
fully-loaded high-end channel strip. Its unique pairing of tried-and-true analog components
with the audio fidelity of today’s advanced circuit designs will lend your recordings
unparalleled vividness and warmth. And with the optional digital interface in place,
the DTC™ will seamlessly fit into your digital studio environment.
The people who have joined forces to comprise the MindPrint team share years of experience
from the fields of pro audio, tube circuitry, and digital technology. In this new MindPrint
product, they have applied their collective know-how to meet the expressed wishes of
countless studio engineers the world over.
Over the past several years, modern recording equipment has achieved a very high level of
quality at continually improving prices. Often, however, much of the real potential of the
recording is unfortunately lost due to inadequacies at either the input stage, the digital
conversion stage, or the analog circuitry used around the converter.
The DTC™ provides precisely this missing link in the signal chain, delivering those very
elements and features that bring out the best of your other recording equipment.
The resulting sound is more dimensional, more vivid and more truly musical.
One of the underlying design principles behind the DTC™ is optimization of the signal paths.
In each and every design decision the shortest possible signal path was chosen, bypassing
unneeded components completely.
All in all, the very effective filtering, the opto/tube-compressor and the optional digital inputs
and outputs (24-bit/96 kHz) combine to make the DTC™ a universal processing center for
every kind of audio signal.
We wish you a great deal of enjoyment and success with your new DTC™!
St. Wendel, Germany
December 2001
5
MindPrint-DTC
TM
Info
In the digital age achieving a higher level of quality is
something that is nearly impossible to do with just
higher sampling rates or bit depths. Digital
processing quality is better than ever, and has
reached a level (with the new DVD standard) that
meets even the highest sonic and dynamic
requirements. With a sampling rate of 96 kHz we can
reproduce frequencies that are more than double the
highest frequencies man's hearing mechanism is
capable of perceiving. A resolution of 24 bits offers us
a dynamic range that can capture sound at pressure
levels that go far beyond the threshold of pain of
human hearing. In the past, our attempt to
reproduce all the perceptible nuances of a sound was
severely limited by the available technology; today
we are much closer to capturing all the details of a
sound in its full glory.
Question
Since digital technology today is capable of such
high resolution, one would think that the best and
shortest connection would be a pure analog-to-
digital converter. So why is MindPrint now
developing high-end analog technology?
Answer
Even more important than the quality of the digital
converter itself is the quality of the analog circuitry
preceding the converter. Today the only part of the
signal chain that is subject to loss is the analog
section that prepares the signal right before it hits
the digital realm. The task of the DTC™ is to make
this part of the path as good and as short as possible.
The thing to keep in mind is that the sound of
instruments and microphones occur in the analog
realm, as waves and current, and not as bits and
samples. And waves and current are very sensitive as
to how they react to physical quantities such as
impedance, capacitance, and induction. And only
when we pay proper attention to these quantities,
and waves and current are turned into the "right
form," do we stand a good chance of performing a
proper conversion to digital. Technically speaking, the
job of the DTC™ is to take a very weak modulating
eleHigh-Zensitivity™ Transformer. The complex
interplay of impedance, capacitance and induction in
the input transformer is responsible for the optimal
matching of the microphone's diaphragm to its
electronics, and aids considerably in enabling the
microphone to reproduce sound in a natural manner.
MindPrint has researched these phenomena and
collaborated with the company Hauffe to develop
a new transformer.
This sophisticated transformer possesses the
advantageous sound characteristics known from older
models, but avoids their common side effects, such as
phase distortion in the treble region. It can do so
because it has such an extremely broad frequency
range (up to 127 kHz) that the phase distortion
occurs out of the range of human hearing.
Furthermore, because it has a turns ratio of 1:5 the
transformer makes life easier for the subsequent
amplifier stage, thereby reduces distortion and makes
it possible to achieve an extremely good signal-to-
noise ratio.
ENGLISH
Table of Contents:
1. The Input. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
2. Equalization: Frequency Processing . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
3. Compressor/Limiter: Dynamics Processing. . . . . . . . 14
4. The Output . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
5. Technical Specifications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
6. Appendix: The Digital Option . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
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