Universal Audio UAD-1e
A PCI Express card for people whose CPU wasn't enough.
Overview
The UAD-1e is a PCI Express x1 DSP card from Universal Audio. New motherboards had started shipping with PCIe slots, and the original PCI-format UAD-1 cards no longer had a home. It isn't a glamorous object - a card, a bundle of plug-in authorizations, a voucher. But it comes from a specific moment in the project studio, when the processor in your machine was fast enough to record a lot of tracks but not fast enough to run the classic compressor and EQ emulations that engineers actually wanted.
The card is rated at 1x PCIe bus speed, and Universal Audio confirmed that it works in any speed PCI Express slot - 1x, 4x, 8x, 16x, and so on. That's handy if you've ever bought a card that only liked the slot it was born in. The card is cross-platform, Mac and PC, and it coexists in one system with a UAD-1 PCI card, up to four cards total. For studios that had already invested in the older format, that mattered. The UAD-1e didn't orphan the old hardware. Both generations could share a machine.
The plug-in format is VST or AU, with RTAS support available through a free VST-to-RTAS wrapper that ships as part of the installer. Owners report that the card is stable and scalable, though the plug-ins are DSP-hungry, so one card is not always enough.
Universal Audio sold the UAD-1e in bundles rather than as a bare card. The Express PAK paired the card with a 100 UAD$ voucher for additional plug-ins. The Expert PAK paired it with a 750 UAD$ voucher. EQ Magazine (February 2007, p.52) covered the card alongside the Precision Mastering Bundle. The reviewer concluded that the UAD line was rock-stable, scalable, and complemented by some of the best-sounding plug-ins available.
The Precision Mastering Bundle is where a lot of UAD-1e owners started. It bundles a Precision Equalizer, a Precision Multi-Band compressor, and a Precision Limiter. The Precision EQ is a stereo (or dual mono) four-band equalizer with a high-pass filter, stepped gain controls in 0.5dB increments across the ±0 to 3dB range and 1dB increments from ±4 to 8dB, and overlapping bands that allow experimental boosts and cuts other EQs could not perform. EQ Magazine (February 2007, p.53) found the EQ to be an intriguing blend of transparency and musicality - not as clean as some competing mastering EQs, but not particularly colored either - and noted that in a straight-ahead rock mix it tamed low-mid mud well. The same review argued that the Multi-Band and Limiter, though labeled as mastering tools, were among the best mixing tools the reviewer had heard in a while.
Neve emulations were the other big draw. Universal Audio's Neve titles for the card included the 1073/SE, 1081/SE, 33609/SE, and 88RS - four Neve emulations, with three of them carrying a "light CPU load" SE version, making seven different items in the pack. The Neve 1073 and 1073SE EQ were sold exclusively for the UAD-1e and UAD-1, and the marketing billed the 1073 as the most widely used EQ in popular music. That's the company's own advertising talking, not an independent verdict.
The UAD-1e also appeared in multi-card bundles. The UAD Nevana X2 packed two PCIe UAD-1e DSP cards together with authorization for the base UA Mix Essentials plug-in set and all seven Neve titles, plus a $200 bonus voucher toward any plug-in in the online store.
Pricing, per EQ Magazine (February 2007, p.53), put the UAD-1e Express PAK at $750 list and the Expert PAK at $1,299 list. The Precision Mastering Bundle was $500 on its own. The Precision EQ was $199, the Precision Multi-Band $249, and the Precision Limiter $199. The Pro Audio Review buyer's guide (October 2007) listed the Nevana X2 at $200, which looks like a promotional or partial figure rather than the full bundle price, so treat that number with caution.
The limitations are plain. Multi-mono mode is not supported in Pro Tools. The plug-ins are DSP-hungry, so a single card may not carry a dense mix. The whole proposition also depends on a PCIe slot in a machine that still accepts one. Collectors and working engineers note that the UAD-1e is a period piece now, from the era when DSP acceleration was a serious answer to a real problem. Its value today is tied to the plug-in authorizations it carries and to whether the buyer still has a host machine that can take it.
eBay Listings
As an eBay Partner, we earn from qualifying purchases. This helps support our independent vintage technology research.