Rupert Neve Designs Portico II MBC Master Buss Converter & Limiter

According to the company, the MBC represents “the ultimate tool for creating digital signals with the tone, transparency and power expected from Rupert Neve Designs,” and includes a fully-featured analog limiter, 24-bit/192kHz conversion fed by selectable analog drive paths for tonal versatility, high-resolution metering, word clock I/O, analog XLR inputs and simultaneous AES, S/PDIF, and TOSLINK outputs.

The newly developed analog drive circuitry allows the MBC’s converter to be fed by either a class-A transformerless path for maximum transparency, or by purpose-built interstage audio transformers with the company’s own variable Silk Red and Blue circuitry to control harmonic content and drive saturation for a wide variety of tonal enhancements. From Rupert Neve Designs: “The MBC was designed for reference performance regardless of genre or desired sonic character, and the key to this lies in the quality and adaptability of the analog drive circuitry.”

The MBC’s Compound Active Release Analog Limiter section has a class-A line amp stage with up to 20dB of gain, adjustable threshold and release controls, and an insertable high-pass side-chain filter fully sweepable from 20Hz to 250Hz. “The resulting limiter achieves both transparency and the capability of pushing the level of tracks or mixes without damage to the integrity of the source.” The limiter may be used in dual mono or stereo linked operation.