Rupert Neve Designs RNDI

The RNDI contains a custom Rupert Neve-designed output transformer and class-A, discrete FET input stage. This carefully designed combination is the key to the RNDI's unparalleled performance, delivering a powerful and vibrant direct sound that captures the full harmonic depth of basses, guitars, acoustic instruments, and even pre-recorded material.

With portable, powerful, larger-than-life tone for a variety of instrument and amplifier signals, the RNDI is truly the first stand-alone DI worthy of the Rupert Neve name.

After coming into existence during an experimentation with new transformer designs, the RNDI was fine-tuned over a series of listening tests against the most popular high-end DIs available. It was in these tests where the RNDI always seemed to add another dimension to the sound and bring the instruments to life. The lows felt richer, deeper and fuller, and the highs had outstanding clarity without any added harshness.

The RNDI’s signature sound is the result of a new Rupert Neve-designed output transformer and a class-A, discrete FET input stage. The carefully orchestrated union of these two elements is key to the RNDI's accuracy, tone and response.

The custom output transformer provides exceptional isolation while introducing musical harmonics and dimension to the sound. The low impedance, transformer-balanced output excels at driving long cable runs, and performance is immensely consistent regardless of the connected equipment. This is very important for both live and studio environments where the audio signal may travel over 100ft before hitting an amplifier.

The class-A, discrete FET input stage in the RNDI is powered by 48V phantom, providing a high impedance input of 2.2M Ohms that ensures consistent performance with a wide variety of instruments. The class-A design introduces no crossover distortion to the signal, which can add upper-order odd harmonics that are musically dissonant in nature. With the RNDI, the majority of harmonic content is a pleasing combination of 2nd order (octave) and 3rd order (fifth above octave). These musically relevant harmonics, present in subtle amounts, enhance the richness of the original signal and provide a distinctly musical response. And the discrete nature of the RNDI design means there are no ICs or digital components that can have negative effects on the tone.

In Instrument Mode, the RNDI's uniquely high input headroom of +20.5 dBu is capable of handling not only instruments, but a wide variety of sources, such as synths, keyboards, drum machines and even pre-recorded material. This allows the RNDI to inject that coveted Rupert Neve Designs tone into a wide variety of sources.

In speaker mode, the RNDI can handle the screaming output of a 1000-watt solid-state power amplifier (92 Vrms or 266Vp-p) to capture the full tone of the instrument, preamplifier, EQ, inserts, and the amplifier's output stages before it hits the speaker cabinet. This technique allows the engineer to avoid any bleed in a live environment and any unwanted tone added by the speaker cabinet or microphone. Also, speaker mode can be especially useful when feeding the RNDI line-level sources since it increases the input headroom even further.