The case for hardware effects

With Elgato's new Wave Next devices out in the wild, you may be wondering why you would want to have all your voice processing baked in. Isn't it better to have more options later? What if something wasn't quite right and now you can't fix it? Here are the pros and cons.

The case against

Using hardware, digital signal processing (DSP), or otherwise "baking in" your effects has a number of advantages, but it's also important to understand why you wouldn't want to do that. The first, and probably most obvious, reason is cost, though DSP options like the new Wave devices can help there. The cheapest channel strips, which are devices that combine a preamp with other processing like EQ and compression, cost $200 or more. Higher quality options often exceed $1000. Meanwhile, all the same processing can be done right in OBS for free! That's a lot to ask of a new creator.

The second reason is flexibility. If you bake in your effects, you (usually) don't have a raw mic signal to work with later and you can't just remove the effects you used. Maybe you were a bit too aggressive with your noise gate and some critical audio is missing, or maybe you went too hard on compression and it just sounds bad. When you're new to audio, the prospect of being unable to fix something you did wrong is terrifying.

The final case against baking in your effects applies mostly to DSP devices like Wave. What if it just stops working? Admittedly, this is a lot of what inspired me to write this post. Looking at the Elgato subreddit, there seems to be a near constant stream of issues with the new Wave devices. I'd love to recommend them as they are affordable, easy to use, and very powerful, but so many people are having issues. And what if Elgato stops updating them and a Windows update breaks them? And yes, I realize any hardware can break, but professional audio gear is made to last decades and doesn't care what operating system you're using.

The case for

Still not convinced it's a bad idea? Good, because if you can get past the downsides, there are some great reasons why you should bake in your effects. First and foremost, imagine sounding exactly the same regardless of... well, anything. OBS, Discord, Windows, Mac, Linux, you name it. If you do all your processing before you even get to the computer, then it doesn't matter what app or even OS you're using, you'll always sound just how you like. Remember above how I said software bugs were a great reason not to bake in your effects? If you're just not using software for your effects at all, no bug or update can break your setup.

The second reason is OBS-specific, but still handy. OBS has an option to use their built-in compressor as a sidechain ducker. For those of you who don't know, this means that you can put the compressor on your game audio, then, whenever you talk, the game audio will become quieter. This allows you to keep the game louder, but still be heard when you talk. It's great except that the sidechain is taken before any effects are applied to your voice, meaning the amount of reduction applied to the game audio is a lot more variable. When you bake in the compression, your voice is a much more consistent level when it hits the sidechain input, so the amount of reduction is a lot more consistent, too.

The final reason is ownership. These days, everything you buy is just a revokable license to a digital product. If the system can't authorize you or the company just decides you can't use the software anymore, you're out of luck. When you buy a piece of hardware, unless someone physically steals it, that's yours, forever. It's nice to actually own something again, isn't it?

A bonus tip here regarding flexibility. I said earlier that when you bake in your effects, you don't have a backup in case something in the effects chain goes wrong. That's true, but some hardware effects units have ways around that. The popular DBX 286s, for example, has an insert that you can use to send the unaffected signal to your interface in addition to the one with effects applied, giving you a backup in case you set the gate too aggressively. Similarly, the 500 series rack I use, the Cranborne 500ADAT, allows me to record the signals from the preamp and the final compressor at the same time. I have yet to run into an instance where I actually needed the raw signal, but if that concerns you, you have options.

Conclusions

Hopefully this has given you some insight into why you might actually want to try baking in your effects using hardware, with the only real downside being cost. And to that end, there are options. While I wouldn't normally encourage people to buy clones, if the DBX 286s is too rich for your blood, Behringer does make a clone of it, the UV1, for half the price. You'll certainly get better quality by going more expensive than either of those, but as a way to test the waters, there's no shame in trying something cheap, especially if you can get it used.