Samson D3500

[skirmash]

I know that the decisions in this particular forum tend to be based around Behringer products, but I was exploring the options for a Digital Parametric Eq that has digital in and out.

I found the Samson D3500 which seems to fit the bill nicely. It needs a Samson Digital Accessory card that plugs into the back of the D3500 to give it the SPDIF Input/Output that I require.

From a functionality perspective, this units seems to stand up pretty well. It has 30 Parametric EQs and has High/Low Pass filtering too (not that I will need the latter in my setup).

Is there any reason why no one has mentioned this unit before?

For someone like me who is going to use an outboard DAC and Crossover, this unit seems pretty well featured.

Does anyone have any thoughts on this subject?

Kind regards,

Ash

[Sonnie]

Hi Ash and welcome to the Shack!

This is the first I've heard of the Samson unit. Looks almost like the Behringer 1124p with a few more options and might be a viable option.

Frequency Filter Center Freq. 20 Hz - 20 kHz

I wonder if we could get Samson to allow filter adjustments to 10Hz?

Bandwidth Filter Bandwidth 1/60th -10 Octaves

Impressive.


The manual appears to be much more user friendly that the Behringer.

Lowpass high Cut Filter 2 kHz - 20 kHz
Lp-Order Filter Slope 0, 6, 12, 18 per Octave
Highpass low Cut Filter 20 Hz - 200 Hz
HP-Order Filter Slope 0, 6, 12, 18 per Octave

This will be a welcomed addition for many users.

This is interesting:

The GATE effect allows you to eliminate annoying buzzes
and hums. The DELAY effect is perfect for phase aligning
speakers systems using multi-transducers and for delaying
speaker arrays in large venue installations. The Delay
can be set from 0 to 85 milliseconds.

This might be a little suspect (obviously it's optional... but interesting still...):

The D3500 has a unique digital Enhancer, which can help
sweeten a sound system, and at the same time, reduce
unwanted noise. The D3500’s Enhancer uses several
powerful algorithms to analyze the signal content and
then decide how to enhance the signal; based on that
content. If the D3500 Enhancer senses that there is music
playing with good high frequency content, it will slightly
boost these frequencies creating sweet and airy top-end
response. When the D3500 Enhancer sees that there is little
or no high-frequency content, it will slightly reduce the
high-frequency response of the system. This can be especially
useful since often when the high-frequency content
is very low, or off, the only thing you hear is system hiss.
The Enhancer will recognize the noise and reduce it by
cutting the associated EQ filters automatically.

99 Memory Presets... $200-230 street price.

Not too bad.

[brucek]

Is there any reason why no one has mentioned this unit before?

I hadn't seen this unit before. Looks fine though. Decent enough specs. Most people seem to want consumer level (-10dBV) input/output though, and this is a PRO level device. But for those that are using PRO level, it looks good.

brucek

[JCD]

I wonder if they'd consider some of the ideas that we have in our "wish list".

Also, wonder how it does in a home audio environment (i.e., noise introduced?).

Still, more options is better options.

JCD

[skirmash]

Well.

I am probably going to jump in with 2 feet and try one. Long term I will probably go with a Tact unit and their amplification. However, the budget and my desire to learn more about this stuff means that learning REW and dabbling with improving my existing system without major expense is the immediate way forward.

I will essentially be running a CD/DVD Transport (in the medium term a music server) passing 2 channel PCM through the Samson using the Digital ins and out and into my Proceed Avp2 pre/processor.

I am using the Avp2 in dual sub mode to support both inputs of the Gallo Reference 3.1 speakers. Amplification is via an EAD 8300 multi-channel amp.

I am pretty anal about everything sounding as natural as can be. I am pretty happy to report back on how the Samson impacts the whole chain. I guess this will need to be a "you scratch my back I scratch yours" kind of arrangement because I am a real newbie when it comes to this whole measuring room response in REW thing. I need to purchase everything necessary to make it work - aside from the laptop. Sound card and Galaxy here I come.

Kind regards,

Ash

[Sonnie]

Thanks Ash...

We have some brilliant guys to help with REW... no doubt about that.


I spoke with a fellow at Samson today. I'm not sure it they are really interested or not, but if we could ever get one of these companies to realize just how much we could promote a product for them, I believe they would be amazed at their sales. A few minor changes and they would be bombarded with orders.

It's hard to get folks enthused about it anymore because it seems none of the companies will listen to the market anymore... or they just aren't interested in anything but the pro market.

It's not just parametric equalizers that get sold... measurement mics, mic amps, power amps... one thing leads to another. No telling how much we've helped Behringer's bottom line over the last 5-6 years. It's like these companies are just plain blind.

Anyway... we would be very interested in hearing more about the Samson unit. Although unless they made a few changes, I doubt it will every up the Behringer for the front runner. It might still be a viable option for those needing a built-in crossover and delay.