HLabs PRE169 Willi Ltd Edition - a piece of history for your 500 rack

To celebrate Willi Studer's birth date, we are pleased to introduce a very limited edition of our 500-series PRE169 mic preamp featuring original vintage Studer 169 mixing console input and output transformers.

Having spent 20 years servicing professional audio hardware, including several classic Studer consoles, our founder, Jérôme Champlet, has become an expert in this incredible design by Willi Studer, which was introduced in the late 1970s.

It not only sounds good, with very clean (for the era), natural and wide musicality, but it was also cleverly designed to be affordable (for the high-end market) and easy to maintain. The heritage of Willi Studer will always inspire us, whether we are working on classic designs or new original ones.

In 2014, we designed our standard PRE169 with a similar approach. The input stage closely match the original Studer circuit, including the Neutrik NTM4 transformer — the Studer continuation model, while the output stage has been tweaked to make the mic preamp more versatile overall, with a massive Carnhill VT24499 transformer.

For this Willi Limited Edition, we sourced original input (1.022.400.00) and output (1.022.352.00) transformers from old 169 and 269 channel strips. This Studer output transformer produces a slightly more coloured sound, particularly when driven hard. With the output trim, you can adjust the amount of output transformer load, switching from a very clean sound to a subtle saturation.

Despite all the functionalities remaining exactly the same, these unique pieces have slight differences in their specifications.
You get a whopping 71 dB of gain (+4 dB from the standard PRE169), with a maximum output level peaking at +25 dBu.
The brushed aluminium faceplate with unique printing is inspired by the classic design of old Studer mixing desks — timeless and minimalist.

The PRE169 Willi Ltd Edition is a piece of history for your 500-series rack.

Only 11 units. Available now. 730€ ex-VAT.
www.hlabs.audio/product/pre169-willi-ltd-edition