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TC Electronic C300
Evan Kirkendall:
More, as promised:
I still haven’t had a chance to get it out of the house much, but it's done 2 gigs on kick.
Anyway, gig 2 with it was much easier. Now that I know how to use it, I was much quicker with setting it. I worked it hard too! I was running the input on it all the way up to "-3" and I even managed to clip it from time to time. Didn’t sound like it was being pushed though. Even when you hit “overload” there was no auditable distortion.
I also experimented with the gate some more. Using a slower attack gets rid of the clicking, but you also lose some of the attack when used on kick. Basically, it couldn’t keep up with double basing. So, I’m just running it on its fastest setting. However, the gate is a lot better then the dbx 266xl's gate. Since this is a multi band comp, the gate is also limited to whatever setting you run it on. When I ran the 266xl on the kick the snare would make the gate open. This does not happen with the C300. The gate only opens when the kick hits. That was something I really like about the unit.
Onto the comp section: I haven’t played around with this too much, but again, comparing it to the 266xl, the c300 wins. I run my kick channel hot, and the 266 wouldn’t catch all the peaks. My kick channel would clip from time to time, even though the 266 was comping. The C300 doesn’t let a peak by! I didn’t clip the kick channel once during both times I used it.
More coming soon! I plan on using it on lead vocals, toms and bass guitar over the next few gigs. Ill be running it against my 1046.
But wait, how about some pictures?
Its a very shallow unit! The C300 is about 3" smaller then the 266xl. This is great if you dont have a very deep rack to work with.
Everything is very well labeled! Just flip the big knob to what you plan on using it for, set the threshold and go! Its very easy to use and is basically idiot proof.
Also, notice the routing switch. It can be run as 2 seperate units, or 1 gate/comp with the flip of a switch.
Ive got to upload the rest of my pics still. So, more coming later this afternoon!
Evan
PS- If you have an M300 efx unit, dont mount the 2 right next to each other. I found myself chaning the comp. settings instead of the efx from time to time.
Rickk Kreuzer:
Gentlemen-
Thank you both for your reviews! I've been intrigued myself with this product. I've been thinking of going a different route and getting rid of my Presonus ACP88, which I've been for the most part happy with, but now have a bit more real estate in my rack which has me rethinking some things.
Price point is quite compelling. Glad to hear that it's decent TC stuff. Have either of you messed with the M300 yet?
Rickk
Evan Kirkendall:
Yep. We both have the M300's. They are great units as well.
PM me if you have any questions.
Thanks,
Evan
Bennett Prescott:
I just (well, a couple of days ago, but I've been busy) finished a one week festival gig that really took my system to the limits and let me explore a little better the capabilities of the C300.
The show was a 400 capacity "talent tent" at a local county fair that we packed each day. 3 completely different shows and 5 show times from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. or so, Monday through Sunday. A talent search in the morning with vocalists, guitarists, track acts, and pianists. A quick break for lunch, followed by (depending on the day) a mariachi band, Vocal Trash (a percussion and singing act from Texas), Taylor Ware yodelling, a fashion show, and/or several gospel rock groups. If you look closely you can almost see the PA I brought:
What I'm trying to say is that I used the compression sections of the C300 on an extremely wide variety of signal sources, with zero soundcheck or setup time for each act and no possible expectation for consistency between vocalists or instrumentalists. The on the fly adaptability of the C300 really came in handy here... depending on who grabbed what mic for what source, I had the ability to select a preset with a quick flip of a knob and then adjust my threshold and output gain to get an appropriate amount of squeeze on each source. Easy as pie.
I was also pleasantly surprised to find how transparent the C300 is even when you're not watching it and your vocalists starts using the mic like they should have 5 minutes ago, the only indication that you're taking 20dB off them is the meter on the device. Extremely transparent, very well thought out presets that really help tame different types of source material and a simple user interface make this box my new go-to for generic mostly-analog-realm compression. Even the metering is a little closer to "pro" than one might expect, with separate overload indication plus threshold for each channel. That, combined with 6-segment LED ladders for input dBFS and gain reduction make it simple to tell what's going on inside the device. I'll say it again: give it a try, it takes the pants of anything else even near the price point, with the exception of the FMR RNC which isn't quite as user-friendly.
Here's a few more shots of the C300 sitting in my FOH rack:
Karl Bader:
Evan,
Did you ever put this particular comp on more important channels like vocals? I'm curious from more than one point of view how it was. I've seen it, just haven't used it. I'm one of those guys who would rather have no compression than a crappy comp. So far I have not been impressed with DBX's stuff the 166s new or old, I think the 1046s are ok... How does it rate compared to them? Or even up to the higher end comps? Would they be something for an A rig? How rider acceptable do you all see these things? Also what happens when pushed really hard? Do they crap out or are they pretty steady?
Also, Evan, you stated that you used it as a gate, and you compared it to a DBX266xl's gating function? How does it compare to other gates? ie, Valley People, Drawmer, BSS, etc.?
Thanks,
Karl
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