dbx 266 Project 1

Very easy unit to use and standard practice for compressors. Read the manual, as always.

Major problem with channel 1 as it locks up every now and then. No audio gets through unless you really spike the audio. Obviously not the design intent. Otherwise, quality is quite good for live sound. The gate is great for cutting back background noise. Play with the ratio control here and you'll enjoy the results.

As stated, channel 1 cuts out completely occasionally. If this did not occur, I would love this unit.

Always top of the heap.

Buy it, read the manual, play around with it for a few hours, and enjoy it. Great unit.

as any compressor, if you know how to, really easy

I bought 2 for 100$, sor for the price it's awesome, it's 10 years old so it's a bit noisier than my newer 266 XL, but really clean

only problem I have with it is the always on overeasy, sometimes it's good to have a Hard knee

mfg date is 1996 in this one and it's in perfect condition and the outside shows it hab been used a lot, came without PSU and manual gives no info as for mA or even Watts, just 18VAC, so I used a behringer UB-802 PSU(2X18,5VAC) to drive both of them, no problem so far beside a little buzz(vommon ground)

the manual for the 266 project 1 is non existant on dbx site, only the 266A project 1 and the 266 but hey, beside specs (specifically the gate attack time) there is no need for it)

great comp, I use one for my bass and lead synth and the other as a pumper(for bennassi basslines) and the other half as a trance gate (I use a beatbox with 2 sidechain tracks to trigger them)

The ease of use is no worse or better than most compressors. I do like the over and Under LED's. The manual is written decently.

I think the unit sounds pretty good. The design under the cover is pretty well done considering the timeframe it was done. The only thing I would change is the power supply decoupling and bulk storage caps could be increased, as well a ground plane instead of a star'd traces ground should have been used. But for what it is it works pretty well. I didn't notice much self noise as other have mentioned. The sound is very similar to other DBX VCA's. Not too bad for the $50USD I paid.

I think this unit will work fine, there doesn't seem to much over heating going on inside.

No issues that need reporting

For the buck this compressor is a nice addition to my rack.
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I've recorded on inserts with a Behringer mixer (I NEVER USE EQ But channels sound cleaner than others I've used).
It's easy and fast to tweak but not interesting for mastering.

Really thick and bright sound (better than samson, behringer, yamaha, alesis...).

...it is hardware...
The overeasy led helps to adjust the "interesting" compression Threshold...

I didn't need anytime.

No problem, of course, a compressor can pull up some background noise, but it happens when it's not tweaked properly. A better response than some plugins and a good recording channel when using as an insert.

This is a farly sophisticated compressor that does take a little tweaking to get a good sound. I think it is very easy to use.

Unlike the other reviewer I get a great sound out of this unit. I slave the two channels. for guitar it's great. Even for vox or drums it does what it's supposed to hwich is add punch.

I have had this unit for approx. 7 years plugged in constantly never had a problem

Never had to deal with them

I think the problem people have with compressors is they don't know how to use them. I get great sound out of my unit. I've read other reviews of other units and it's the same-the range is it totally sucks to it's unbelievably great. This unit works really well, is quiet, and is reasonable.

I have a Project 1 DBX 266. I found it easy to use and dial up settings I wanted. Although, the gate has a tendency to do a lot of breathing.

The sound quality of the DBX 266 (project 1) is kind of muddy. I used it do all my mixes with and found my mixes didn't sound as good as other peoples who were using gear that was not as sophisticated as mine. I guess that teaches me to use a cheap compressor on my mixes.

I never had problems with it other than the self noise and the muddy sound.

Overall I do not recomend the DBX 266 (Project 1). The self noise and muddy sound made me wonder why dbx would make this. The newer model the 266XL is far better than the older DBX 266 (Project 1). I guess they realized their mistake and came out with a new model.