Mercury 66 Studio Tube Limiting Amplifier

The Mercury 66 Studio Tube Limiting Amplifier is an all-tube, all-transformer, fully balanced, variable-bias limiter based on the most sought after product in this genre, the legendary Fairchild 660. This limiting amplifier is recognized as an essential tool for making great recordings. Many manufacturers have tried to copy the Fairchild circuit but have failed to capture the sonic essence and overall tone of the original. Until now.

Mercury Recording Equipment has gone to great lengths to recreate the pride and passion of the past, both sonically and aesthetically, while offering the reliability of a modern build. The choices made in looks, layout, functionality, features and build quality all answer back to one question: How would "they" have done it today? So, the Mercury 66, like all Mercury products, has no ICs (chips), and is proudly hand built and assembled in the USA using no-compromise parts/components and has transformer balanced inputs and outputs. With the vintage style VU meter, large bakelite knobs and powder coated chassis and front panel, the Mercury 66 has a very distinctive 1950s aesthetic so that they look as good as they sound!

The 66 uses a single push-pull stage of amplification which are transformer coupled input and output (XLRs) with no capacitors in the signal path, with a high control voltage. The result: the unit never produces any audible thumps, and has low distortion and noise under all conditions (either as a limiter or straight-through amplifier). The control amplifier is also fully balanced, transformer coupled in/out. The unit makes use of a very stable high current vacuum tube voltage regulator. It has ample and accessible input, threshold, attack, release time and metering controls allowing for convenience in the control room when making adjustments. The attack time is very fast and catches short transients. The release time of 0.3 to 25 seconds provides real flexibility: Three positions of the six available make the release time a function of program material, with fast recovery for short duration peaks and overall reduction of program level should the program level remain high. It can be used as a limiter or compressor. For example, use it as a 2 to 1 ratio compressor with a threshold 5 dB below average level, or as a peak limiter with a 20 to 1 ratio with threshold 10 dB above normal program level, or anywhere between these extremes.

FEATURES:

• Exceptional tone and musical focus
• Absence of audible thumps, distortion or noise
• Extremely fast attack time that can produce full limiting in 1/5000th of a second
• Variable release time from 0.3 seconds to 25 seconds
• Useful as a limiter or a compressor depending on the program material and control settings
• Reliability and stability (All components operate well below their rated maximums)
• All tube, fully balanced (push-pull) transformer coupled circuitry
• Simple, easy to use controls