Behringer Ultra-Curve DSP-8000
A digital EQ, real-time analyzer, and feedback killer in one box. It was the processor that marked Behringer's move into digital, priced to undercut a rack of separates.
Overview
The Ultra-Curve DSP-8000 marked Behringer's move into digital technology. It brought digital graphic equalization and a host of other sophisticated functions to the mainstream audio user at what contemporary coverage described as an exceptionally affordable price. Setting up the main room EQ for a sound system used to demand a high-priced real-time analyzer, a signal generator, and a calibrated measuring microphone. Now it could sit within reach of everyone. Behringer's own advertising framed the DSP8000 alongside its optional ultra-linear omnidirectional ECM8000 measuring mic as "an affordable and practical option to get the job done quickly and easily," and promised an unbelievably wide range of supplementary functions at the company's established audio quality.
At its core the Ultra-Curve is a fully digital 31-band stereo graphic equalizer. The converter section dates the design. It has high-grade 20-bit A/D and D/A converters with 64-bit internal processing, which was genuinely ambitious for the price class when the unit appeared. Period advertising for the Ultra-Curve line carried the "64-Bit Dual-DSP Processor Mainframe" banner across the trade press. A later revision of the same advertising upped the converter claim to 24-bit. The 20-bit figure is the one attached to the original documentation and the 24-bit claim belongs to a subsequent ad revision, so the two aren't necessarily describing the same build.
Three fully parametric stereo EQs handle notch filtering, with three bands per channel offering +16 to -48 dB of gain range and fine tuning down to 1/60-octave widths. The on-board real-time analyzer does both peak and RMS weighting. It's paired with a noise generator and a spread of auxiliary functions - Auto EQ, variable integration time, peak hold - that let the box measure a room and then correct it without a separate analyzer in the rack. The graphic section is a digital stereo 31-band design advertised as "true response," with up to 100 EQ curves that can be named and stored. An Auto-Q function does the measuring and correction legwork automatically.
The dynamics and utility features are where the DSP-8000 earns its rack space. There's a limiter with variable threshold and Interactive Gain Control, which Behringer claimed protects against overload without distortion. There's also a digital noise gate using Interactive Ratio Control for a level-dependent expansion ratio and what the company described as jitter-free performance. A "Search and Destroy" feedback suppression feature lets any of the six parametric EQ bands seek out and notch unwanted feedback in real time. That's a genuinely useful tool for live sound, and Behringer later refined it into its standalone Feedback Exterminators. Shelving filters with adjustable slope are on board, along with comprehensive input and output metering and full MIDI implementation. Balanced inputs and outputs are provided on both 1/4-inch jack and XLR connectors, and fail-safe relays automatically drop the unit into bypass in the event of a power failure.
Expansion came by way of two options. A delay option offered up to 8 seconds of delay (advertised in one configuration as a 2x 5000 ms delay option), and an AES/EBU option added digital I/O. Both were priced separately from the mainframe. Period advertising listed the Ultra-Curve DSP 8000 at an MSRP of £649.00, with the 2x 5000 ms delay option at £189.00 and the AES/EBU option at £139.00. So the headline figure bought the base unit, not the fully loaded one.
Behringer shipped a Version 2.0 update for the DSP-8000 that added MIDI SysEx control and data dumps, total remote control via PC, EQ design software, faster gate and limiter response, and new 20-bit converters. That last item matters for anyone buying used. A V2.0 unit and an original-build unit may not carry identical converter hardware, so check the version when comparing two examples on the secondary market.
The DSP-8000 turned up in the trade press beyond Behringer's own advertising. Studio Sound (August 1997, p.43) described the DSP8000 and the optional ECM8000 measuring mic as an affordable and practical route to the room-EQ task. The same magazine's August 1997 issue (p.43) carried the ECM8000 pairing, framing the DSP8000 and the optional measuring mic as the affordable route to the room-EQ job that once required a top engineer's skills and a rack of expensive test gear. It wasn't a mastering-grade reference equalizer and Behringer didn't pretend it was. It put measurement, correction, dynamics, and feedback control into a single chassis for less than the separates it replaced.
eBay Listings
As an eBay Partner, we earn from qualifying purchases. This helps support our independent vintage technology research.