Considering buying a Firepod

[timrichter9]

Hello-
I read through all (over 100) reviews of the Firepod on the MF's website. I am concerned with the fact that several reviewers indicated that they thought that the gain available from the mic-pres was weak.
Will a few of you that thought that (if any) on this forum, let me know what you did to compensate... email direct at honda 305 at comcast dot net
or reply to this post. Thanks
Tim Richter

[bluesbreaker18]

I must 1st say that I've only had my Firepod for about a month, and have only used it to record about 10 songs thus far. The mic pres sound very good to me -- at least as good as my Mackie 1402VLZ Pro. The gain seems a bit weaker than what I had available on the Mackie mixer; however definitely enough gain for a nice -12dB signal for recording (which is as hot as I want on any input).

If it helps, here's the equipment I've recorded thus far:

Direct In: SansAmp -> Firepod
Direct In: Zoom GFX-8 -> Firepod
Direct In: (some bass effects processor?) -> Firepod
Mic'd amp: AT2020 -> Firepod
Mic'd amp: Sure SM57 -> Firepod
Mic'd vocals: Sure SM58 -> Firepod

Good luck.

[piersonm]

I dont believe the mic pres are weak, i think that they are just right for an all around great recording. You have the ability to push to that limit if you want, but I like staying under "gained out peaking", leaving myself plenty of room to fill up the mix with other goodies. I've recorded drums (direct mics no mixer), bass (direct no amp) guitar (direct mic w/ amp) and just started doing vocals (direct mic no mixer).
Mixers are great for live, but you want quality, so why blow your dB load? As long as you use quality mics, you shouldnt run into lack of gain.

my two cents