Preamps- what are they??

[Teledriver]

Seems simple enough.
I have 2- Nocturne Jr. Barnyard and the Wampler Plexi Drive Mini.
But are they pre-amps? The Wampler is listed as an overdrive mimicking the Marshall sound (I think). The Jr. Barnyard Jr. is just great, so who cares (sorry, I'm partial to it). Really the Jr. Barnyard is a preamp getting the octal tube amp sound, or am I wrong @TV the Wired Turtle ?

Okay, the point of this thread is - where do pre-amps go in the pedal chain???
Are they actually overdrives?

--> Mimicking a specific amp sound (octal in Tavo's case, or Marshall in the Wampler plexi) should they go last, but before tremolo and reverb and delay (which represent space...the area you are trying to imitate....e.g. the Royal Albert Hall)? So therefore, if I had a BD-2 and/or TubeScreamer they should go before the preamp (Plex and Jr Barnyard).

This is getting confusing, sorry.
I currently run the Jr. Barnyard in front and alone. I then throw in reverb, tremolo and delay as needed (after the Jr.). Makes sense.

If in a classic rock frame of mind, I hit the Marshall (Wampler Mini Plexi in my case). Instant 70's sound using a Les Paul.
Before that I may throw in a MXR Phase 90. Okay, still 70's classic stuff.
80's SRV??? As above, but a TubeScreamer first.
Flavor? a BD-2 with gain at zero (except that I run my BD-2 after my TubeScreamer).

Anyways....are preamps distortion or...pre-amps?

 

[Henry]

Preamp can be with our without distortion.

The loose definition seems to be basically anything that affects your tone, lol. Character pedals, drives, boosts, even eq.

For a stricter definitin, what I've heard is that a true preamp should have the proper output, quantity and quality, to feed directly into a power amp (e.g. bypassing an amps preamp by going directly into the effects loop return).

My guess is that a minority of pedals marketed as preamps fit in the second definition.

 

[wildeman]

Not ODs, they are the flavor of the front end of an amp, which may, in the case of a Marshall flavored pedal, have clipping diodes just like the real amp, and a OD pedal, clear enough?
With something like a Jr B or El Peso I always run my OD/ dist pedals into it, then everything else.

 

[Maguchi]

A preamp is a circuit you can plug directly into a power amp, then into a guitar cab to amplify your guitar. Although you can also plug these types of "standalone" preamps into the front of an existing guitar amp or into the effects loop of an amp. Over the last 3 or 4 decades preamp has also come to mean pedals that go on a pedalboard and color or boost your amp.

I got a couple of standalone preamps from Carvin, an X1 Tube Preamp and a VLD-1 Legacy Drive that will go directly into a power amp and guitar cab. And also a DOD Overdrive Preamp 250 which is the pedalboard type that colors an existing amp.

As far as where in the pedal chain? For a standalone preamp that goes directly into a power amp, probly first. For the pedalboard type that colors an existing amp, pretty early in the chain also. The only pedals I'd put in front of a preamp pedal is pedals that are volume or gain sensitive like maybe an autowah/envelope filter or a pedal that filters out the guitar's pick attack or swells the volume.

But that being said, I'm a big fan of experimenting and moving pedals around to see if you come across something new or different that you may like.

 

[audept]

In the sound reinforcement industry, a preamp is a device that raises the millivolt signal levels generated by microphones, guitar pickups, and similar source capture devices up to volts level for use by power amplifiers. In audio mixing consoles, either analog or digital, the preamp directly affects the sonic quality of the signal and the noise floor levels. Preamps may also include impedance matching characteristics.

 

[Synchro]

In the sound reinforcement industry, a preamp is a device that raises the millivolt signal levels generated by microphones, guitar pickups, and similar source capture devices up to volts level for use by power amplifiers. In audio mixing consoles, either analog or digital, the preamp directly affects the sonic quality of the signal and the noise floor levels. Preamps may also include impedance matching characteristics.

Good answer. In a guitar amp, the preamp section raises signal amplitude (voltage), while the power amp does the heavy lifting, of boosting current. Fair enough.

In a pedalboard, there are usually all sorts of places where a degree of amplification is taking place. For example, the Catalinbread Topanga reverb pedal, which I admire greatly, has a level control, which is basically a preamp. I can, and have, used this as a volume boost for the entire board.

Preamps can be used to create distortion, either by clipping, or by adding enough gain to overdrive a subsequent stage. Every overdrive includes a preamp, and if you turn down the “Drive”, or equivalent control, on an overdrive pedal, and turn up the “Level”, or equivalent control, the overdrive will, in many cases, act like a clean boost.

In some cases, preamps are based on components which have a degree of elasticity, such as the FET preamp built into my Stanley Blue Nebula, and this gives a response like a tube amp, just short of the clipping point, which can be a pleasant effect, in and of itself.

Preamps in a pedalboard can be used to overdrive the front end of an amp, but at least in my experience, this can be dicey. Sometimes the result can be abrupt, even harsh.

I don’t think that there’s a right or wrong place to have a preamp. A clean boost up front can do some good, but I’ve also had good results with a nice clean preamp at the end of the chain. YMMV.

 

[Emergence]

The preamp in my Mesa Boogie Express 5:25 applies gain in stages. Increasing Treble not only increases gain in that frequency band, it increases gain in the Mid and Bass stages as well. It’s hard to get used to and difficult to master but it works. It’s kind of like Gretsch individual volume controls that roll off high frequencies as fast as loudness. I use a BOSS EQ-200 ten band equalizer in front of the amp for tone shaping. I also use it to balance the frequency and input level between guitars so I can leave my amp settings untouched. The equalizer isn’t a preamp but it’s an integral part of the chain.

 

[J Bird]

Like Synchro, I also use the Topanga to open up the tone.

For years, I would set the amp to it's optimal tone, then set pedal levels. Now, more than ever, I find the pedal's sweet spot, then adjust the amp accordingly. Generally, the sweet spots increase the overall volume. In turn, the amp gets turned down to remain at the desired volume.

 

[Byron]

With the Zoom R16, folks used to discuss the power/quality of the onboard preamps. But I've never found where or how the preamp is located or operates. Unless it's the 'gain' control that they're referring too

 

[Synchro]

With the Zoom R16, folks used to discuss the power/quality of the onboard preamps. But I've never found where or how the preamp is located or operates. Unless it's the 'gain' control that they're referring too

The preamps are part of unit itself. When you plug into the Zoom R 16, something has to handle that signal. Every component makes a copy of the input signal and passes that along. There are unity gain preamps, which condition the signal as it comes in, or leaves a device; buffers.

Preamps can also have gain, which boosts the signal. A “clean boost” pedal increases amplitude; makes the signal louder. With a recording device, you want to match the capacity of the recording medium, so the preamp in the recording device can be used to get the signal to the optimum level.

My Zoom R8 has a Gain control on the input, which is set to prevent the input signal from overloading the unit, and a “Peak” LED to let you know when the signal coming in at too high of a level. The input is assigned to a track, and that track has a fader; basically another preamp stage, and this allows you to balance the volume between channels.

Preamps are everywhere. Virtually every pedal has a preamp, although in many cases these preamps are unity gain devices that don’t boost the signal. If a pedal has a volume control, that’s a preamp with adjustable gain.

My Zoom R8 has left a good impression on me. The headroom is reasonable, in fact I run my instruments full-up, which is good, because no signal is being shunted to ground at the instrument. IMHO, that’s a good thing.

Beyond that, the Zoom seems to have plenty of headroom throughout the signal path, so there’s no undesired distortion in the signal, which brings up a an important point. Distortion is a loss of information. To me, it makes the most sense to record clean and have a pristine track, with no loss of information. Then, the output of that track can be piped out of the recorder into a box that route the signal to an amplifier and then that track can be re-recorded with the signal coming from a microphone in front of the amp. This is called “re-amping”, and it allows you to create a good track, and then have infinite opportunities to re-record that track using various effects.

 

[pmac11]

One definition I've read is that a preamp is a device that a) boosts the voltage of the input signal to a level appropriate to the requirements of the power amp section, and b) has some sort of tone shaping ability.