Earthworks Announces First 500 Series Module – 521 ZDT Preamp
(EDITOR’S UPDATE — October 16, 2013: Earthworks announced today that the 521 ZDT Preamp is officially shipping, with a MAP of $999.)
There are many firsts each year at NAMM, but some are more significant than others.
One of the more intriguing ones will arrive at the Earthworks booth, where the company will introduce its first 500 Series module, the 521 ZDT.
The 521 follows in the footsteps of Earthworks 1021 ZDT pre.
No MSRP has been officially announced yet, but the company has confirmed that the price will be less than its 1RU 1021 preamp, which carries an MSRP of $1899, and can currently be had for a street price of $1399. It will begin shipping Spring, 2013.
Here’s more info, direct from Earthworks, on their first 500:
“Based on the ZDT Preamp technology designed by David Blackmer, the 521 ZDT brings the exacting standards of the Zero Distortion Technology preamplifiers to the convenient 500 series format, providing a ‘wire with gain’ option to the 500 series rack.
The solid state ZDT 521 features switchable phantom power, polarity invert, and peak amplitude clip detection, just as in the original 1021 single channel ZDT Preamp. The transformerless output stage of 521 ZDT will easily drive long cable runs without loss of quality, making it ideal for remote recordings. Transparent gain is switchable from 5dB to 60dB in 5dB steps.
The Earthworks mic amp topology provides outstanding common mode rejection, excellent overload margin and an incredibly low noise floor, combined with the ultra wide bandwidth of the ZDT Preamps (1Hz to 200kHz +0.5dB) and distortion of less than 1 part per million (0.0001%). This exceptional level of performance is maintained over an extensive range of impedances applied to the input, making the 521 ZDT suitable for practically any microphone – ribbon, dynamic or condenser.”
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