Behringer 369 2-Channel Vintage Stereo Compressor & Limiter with Custom-Built Midas Transformers
Compression on the master bus was a necessity in the early days of broadcast. This made sure the live-transmitted signal did not blow up the listeners’ speakers at home. Controlling the final dynamics is still paramount today, but back in the day, music producers quickly noticed the sweet “glue-like” effect a quality compressor on the master bus would add to a stereo mix.
One of the most famous stereo compressors from that era – the legendary Neve 33609 – inspired the creation of the Behringer 369.
legacy and DNA of the original Neve 33609
The 369 is actually not that far from home. It is more than just a remake, as the legacy and DNA of the original Neve 33609 flows through the veins of the 369. Behringer engineering team has members, who have personally worked with Rupert Neve himself, imparting valuable knowledge and experience during development of the 369.
369 Dual Channel Operation
The 369 is both a compressor and limiter that offers two distinct modes to control dynamics. The compressor section gives you a more subtle and musical compression while the limiter section clamps down on peaks in your audio signal more aggressively.
Each section is equipped with rotary switches, allowing for precise and repeatable settings. This means consistent compression for every recording or mastering session. You can even set both channels at exactly the same settings if that is what your mix demands.
The Golden Ratio
The 369 compressor gives you plenty of controls, offering a smooth and musical approach to sculpting the dynamic range. It does so without compromising your signal’s natural characteristics. Adjustable Threshold, Recovery, Gain and Ratio controls allow you to set when the compression kicks in, how fast it grabs your sound and when it lets go of it again.
With compression ratios from 1.5:1 up to 6:1, 369 can be as gentle or aggressive as your track needs it to be to sound its best. Presets on the Recovery set a defined baseline decay time that automatically adapts to the signal introduced into the 369 – smooth operation and musical dynamics are finally united.
Time to Clamp Down
The 369’s Limiter takes a more aggressive approach to controlling peaks and dynamics than the compressor part of the unit. Threshold determines at what specific level the Limiter engages while Recovery controls how fast the Limiter bounces back to normal.
With a recovery range from 50 to 800 milliseconds this allows you to work with the Threshold level, a fast or slow Attack time along with Recovery time to make your final mix pump the dance floor or tame those peaks in a more subtle manner – or find that tasty sweetspot somewhere in between.
369’s Additional Controls
Being a two-channel compressor, you can set 369 to stereo or mono operation at the flick of a switch. You can also bypass each compressor and limiter individually for increased flexibility.
Further, the Control switch lets you to toggle between Internal control, allowing you to adjust Mono/Stereo and Bypass functions front panel itself, or External control for remote control via a mixer such as the Behringer WING or any other custom-built remote-control device connected to the Tandem Control Voltage socket on the rear panel.
Ready for Your Studio!
The 2U rackmount chassis of the 369 is extremely sturdy and while born for taking up just a few units of your precious rack real estate, it happily sits in a rack case if you sometimes record on location or want to use it for live sound applications. Either way, 369 is sure to be a perfect fit in your world of pristine dynamics control.
369 Key Highlights:
- Legendary 2-channel stereo compressor and limiter based on the classic 33609 design
- Custom-built Midas input and output transformers
- Completely discrete signal path, ideal for mixing, mastering and broadcast applications