Lunch Box

Lots of people want some tube tone in their signal chain but not everyone needs a complete mixer. To meet the demand for a small number of channels of tube sound, the lunch box project was conceived. This takes the form of a standard 3U high 19 inch rack mounting enclosure which can house four EZTubeMixer modules. The most popular configuration is four tube mic pres and an integral power supply.

The example shown above has four EZTubeMixer mic pres each capable of up to 70dB of gain. Each input has push buttons for phantom power, 20dB pad and polarity reversal. Gain is selectable in 1.5dB steps from 26dB to 60dB with a 10dB trimmer. Each mic pre is housed in its own completely screened plug in module to ensure minimum noise and interference.

Minor variations on this theme are available. For example the Classic tube mic pre design can be used instead of the EZTubeMixer design. The Classic uses only two tubes each of which acts as a stand alone fixed gain stage. Gain is controlled by a single potentiometer and an input pad. and toggle switches are used instead of push buttons on the front panel. Because of its architecture, the Classic design can produce more 'tube tone' than the EZTubeMixer design. Both can be fitted with optional 12dB/octave high pass filters and a balanced line inputs..