Description

The Classic Optical Compressor (Custom) is not another clone – it is a statement. Every unit is hand-built in the USA by Anthony DeMaria (ADL), the engineer the whole industry knows as the man who cracked the “impossible” Fairchild 660/670. This is an optical leveling amplifier assembled the only way it deserves to be: one eyelet, one wire, one joint at a time, entirely by hand.

If you know gear, you know the name. When Tape Op magazine put DeMaria’s recreation of the Fairchild 670 up against a genuine vintage original, the verdict was blunt – they “really were the same machine.” That is the pedigree behind this unit: the same hands, the same obsession, the same refusal to cut a single corner, now pointed straight at the most musical optical compressor ever designed.

So what does that obsession buy you? A leveling amplifier that does everything a classic optical compressor does – the silky, program-dependent squeeze, the famously “invisible” control, the way it flatters a vocal instead of fighting it – and then quietly fixes everything the original got wrong. The 60s supply was always the weak point, so here the power supply has been reworked and the filtering massively beefed up for a dramatically lower noise floor and rock-steady operation, with zero change to the tone. The input and output transformers keep the vintage configuration and are wound in-house on the same cores as the originals, so the weight, the depth and that unmistakable transformer glow are all still there. And at the very heart of the circuit sits an optimised, hand-matched UREI T4B opto cell, kept as close to the original as physics allows in its timing, its ratio and its program-dependent release.

Nothing is modern where it shouldn’t be. The signal path is pure tube and fully discrete – no ICs, no chips, no compromise – with the classic tube complement of 2 × 12AX7A, 1 × 12BH7A and 1 × 6AQ5A. Even the connectors are period-correct: vintage Bakelite (phenolic) XLR housings, the same “electric hardwood” the originals used. Two knobs. Peak Reduction and Gain. A big switchable VU meter. 2U, stereo-linkable, hand-built in the USA.

The numbers are the LA-2A family signature, and then some: 15 Hz – 30 kHz ±0.5 dB, +22 dB clip, 40 dB of gain and 40 dB of gain reduction, program-dependent release of roughly 70 ms to 50% recovery, 600 Ω balanced XLR in and out. In short, an optical compressor that will sit happily beside any original in your rack – and, more often than not, embarrass it.

Assembly options. The Classic Optical Compressor (Custom) comes in two forms. The assembled version is hand-wired, calibrated and tested before it ships. The unassembled version costs a little less – with it, some of the internal components are left for you to fit and wire yourself (the point-to-point harness is prepared, and the step-by-step guide walks you through every connection). The saving is small, because virtually all of the cost – the transformers, the opto cell, the tubes and the chassis – is exactly the same either way.

Two knobs. A switchable VU meter. Bakelite XLR I/O. Hand-built in the USA. This is the optical compressor for people who care where it came from, and how it was made.

inside the unit

• Hand-built, point-to-point wired the old way
• From Anthony DeMaria (ADL) – the engineer who recreated the Fairchild 660/670
• Optimized original UREI T4B opto cell, hand-matched to original spec
• Reworked power supply with far stronger filtering than the original
• Vintage input / output transformers, wound in-house on original-style cores
• Vintage Bakelite (phenolic) XLR connectors
• Pure tube, no ICs · tube complement: 2 × 12AX7A, 1 × 12BH7A, 1 × 6AQ5A
• Available assembled, or unassembled (some assembly required) at a slightly lower price
• 2U mono · stereo-link capable · balanced XLR I/O