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9/17/2007
Incredible auction of vintage audio gear from BBC Glasgow
It looks like BBC Glasgow are auctioning off their entire studio. There are four auctions at the site - 1 and 2 are the most interesting, stuffed with strange old British gear, from patchbays, vectorscopes and sexy outboard (here's an RMX16, and this never-see-one-of-those-before Instant Personality Processor.) The real stars are the serious bits - numerous consoles, Calrec compressors, EMT turntables, and dozens of Rogers/BBC monitor speakers, including several LS5/8 models which are much geeked over by boffins, and come with customised Quad power amps. It does seem tragic that the BBC are losing all this stuff, and presumably the engineers who've kept it in perfect condition for years. Presumably BBC shows are now all made by 15 year-olds on laptops purchased from PC World, and monitored on iPod headphones. The auction ends on 27th Sept. (via Zanf)
Orban recently bought CRL, and killed off their entire product line. But this "Instant Personality Processor" is totally unknown. Possibly this was a custom deivce made for the BBC alone.
ReplyDelete(let me take this opportunity to say that I think that Bob Orban is a fat, arrogant, insufferable blowhard. His legacy will not be fine pro-audio processors, it will be the endless string of "squashers" his company makes...that are routinely used to make music sound like ass over the FM radio--to squeeze out that last dB of dynamic range and let broadcasters sound "louder than the other guy".)
If only I were in the UK so I could get my hands on the Lexicon PCM 70 that's up...
ReplyDeleteThey're just selling off some old stuff to buy some of your awesomely cool vintage gear, so 15-year olds with laptops can use it to produce for tv.
ReplyDeleteHi there - just to set the record straight, we're auctioning off a lot of the obsolete gear from our OLD studios at Queen Margaret Drive, now that we are in situ in our shiny NEW 180 million pounds studios at Pacific Quay with all new digital gear. (hooray!!) It's far better to auction this stuff than to junk it. That way if anyone has a use for it they can get it for a fair price, and we get something back for it. Just in case anyone thought we'd lost our marbles completely.
ReplyDeleteThis stuff has indeed been well maintained, but has also been used hard for years and years, so caveat emptor. Just remember - we're Scottish - do you really think we would be giving good stuff away for nearly free?? :-) (p.s. don't answer that!!)
Dave
If you like vintage music, you'll love luxuriamusic
ReplyDeleteI wish you idiots had just had kept all this to yourself and just bid in secret. Then everyone gets bargains. Complete internet losers.
ReplyDeleteRhys Jones
Mersey Electric Music
Liverpool.