Rupert Neve Designs - Portico 5012 Duo Mic Pre (horiz or vert)

The Portico 5012 from Rupert Neve Designs is a 2-channel microphone preamp that sports Neve's custom input and output transformer designs for a sound that's strikingly similar to that of classic Neve consoles. Each channel of the Portico 5012 is equipped with individually selectable phase, mute, phantom power, and a fully sweepable high-pass filter, along with a "Silk" circuit, which enhances the sound, adding warmth and presence. The Neve sound is one of the most most sought-after of all time, and with the Portico 5012, it's yours at a very reasonable price.

Balanced mic input for premium sound
The microphone input is balanced but not floating, being a variant of an instrumentation amplifier using a "Transformer-Like-Amplifier" (T.L.A.) configuration with a toroidal Common Mode Rejection Low Pass Filter that excludes frequencies above 150 kHz. The T.L.A. is followed by an actual input transformer permitting a full +25 dBu input signal to be handled at unity gain without an input pad over the whole audio spectrum. This combines the advantages of both an "Electronically Balanced" and true transformer input. When the phantom power is disengaged, this input serves as a very high quality line input with an impedance of 10,000 ohms

Low Noise, Low Distortion Operation
Much care was given in designing the 5012 to produce as little noise and non-harmonic distortion as possible. Carefully implemented signal paths and Class A operation are a large part of the 5012's sweet, whisper quiet performance. After all, your most critical recordings deserve the very best, don't they?

Why Transformers?
Input and output circuits must be freed from ground dependence so that only the "wanted" signal enters and leaves the processing path. Transformers are the ideal solution. The sweet and silky sound of Neve's classic consoles was achieved with big transistors and large high-quality transformers. Rupert Neve Designs Portico modules achieve similar quality today without the bulk or the cost.

In order that the Portico modules can work together in a proprietary console-style configuration without producing hum, R.F. interference, or other interactions, the connecting interfaces, grounding, levels and impedances must receive careful attention. Each Portico module is a complete integral signal processor that delivers its specified performance independently. This is one of the reasons Rupert Neve Designs uses transformers.

Add some "Silk" to your sound
What does "Silk" mean? Suffice to say, that it gives a subtle option to enhance sound quality in the direction of vintage modules. The Silk button reduces negative feedback and adjusts the frequency spectrum to provide a very sweet and musical performance.