The CompuRhythm CR-5000 is Roland's 1981 preset-and-programmable rhythm machine, and it sits right in the family tree between the legendary CR-78 and the TR-808. That means proper vintage Roland analog...

Long before the 808 shook subwoofers, the CR-78 was keeping time in a handsome wood-veneer box built to back a home-organ player. Then everyone else got hold of it. That's...

The 1176 is the other most-famous compressor in the world (the FET one), and this is Universal Audio's hand-built reissue of the blackface 1176LN, true to Bill Putnam's D/E-rev design....

There is no overstating this one. The TR-808 is the most influential drum machine ever made: the booming kick, the ticking hats, the cowbell, the snap, the sound of hip-hop,...

The Joemeek SC4 brings the cult British photo-optical compression sound to the stereo bus: smooth, vibey gain reduction that flatters mixes, drums and vocals with character rather than clinical control.The...

The Monster 2 is exactly what it sounds like: a boutique Polish dual-channel beast that bolts a fast FET compressor to a NOS-tube saturation stage and a parallel mix knob,...

The Behringer Composer Pro is the workhorse dynamics box that's lived in budget racks forever, and for good reason: two channels of compressor, peak limiter, expander and gate with the...

In 1976 David Blackmer built the first solid-state VCA compressor and changed recording forever. The 160 is brutally simple, three knobs and a big switchable VU, but it does one...

Ask a roomful of engineers to name one compressor they cannot live without and a scary number will say the Distressor. Since 1995, Dave Derr's EL8 has been the go-to...

The LA-2A is the most famous compressor in the world, and for good reason. This is Universal Audio's faithful reissue of the early-60s Teletronix classic, point-to-point hand-wired in California, using...

Don't let the cartoon fat man fool you: the HHB Radius 3 is a genuine valve stereo compressor with a glowing VU and a brilliantly simple program-based front end. Pick...

FATSO stands for Full Analog Tape Simulator and Optimizer, which is a lot of acronym for a box whose actual job is making digital recordings sound like they went through...

The ART Pro VLA II is the secret-weapon comp for engineers who want LA-style optical squish without the boutique price. Two channels of opto compression with a tube gain stage,...

The Endless Analog CLASP system bridges analog tape and the modern DAW: record through a real tape machine with zero monitoring latency, capturing genuine tape compression and warmth while keeping...

The Jugg Box DPM-48 is an obscure slice of Italian rhythm history: a digital drum machine with a big blue knob, a wall of buttons and a lo-fi character all...

The Warm Audio WA76 is a faithful, fully-discrete take on the legendary 1176 FET compressor, the one that has slammed drums, vocals and bass on countless hit records. Lightning-fast attack,...

A complete hardware mixing desk for your DAW, in two pieces. The Softube Console 1 brings the legendary Solid State Logic 4000 E channel strip to your fingertips: four-band EQ,...

The Yamaha MG124C is the workhorse 12-channel analog mixer that turns up everywhere for good reason: clean Yamaha mic preamps, musical 3-band EQ, built-in compression on the mono channels and...

Ask a roomful of mix engineers about a do-anything stereo compressor and Elysia's Xpressor keeps coming up. This is a discrete Class-A stereo compressor built in Germany to mastering-grade standards,...

The 160S is dbx founder David Blackmer's high-end reimagining of his own legendary 160 VCA compressor, hand-built in the boutique Blue Series. A true-stereo (or dual-mono) VCA compressor with that...

Tascam took Antares Auto-Tune, the technology that quietly rewired pop music, and bolted it onto a proper channel strip. The TA-1VP is a full vocal chain in a single rack...

When a studio needed a workhorse that sounded like a Studer but didn't cost like one, it bought a Revox PR-99. Built in Switzerland on the bones of the legendary...