RNC 1773 : Best in its class (YMMV)

I have two units that I use for live work. On different occasions I had tried them on speech, lead vocals, acoustic guitars, as well as on the main bus. I'm comparing against other budget compressors that I use on a regular basis - DBX 166 XS and Behringer MDX2600.

As far as I can tell the RNC 1773 are completely transparent sonically. Their self-noise is audibly lower than both the 166XS and the MDX2600. This makes them my favorite option so far for speakers and vocals.

As a bus compressors RNCs can help with controlling the dynamics of a band in an unobtrusive way. By all chances they may never become a 'legendary' bus-comp but they will help with keeping the 'this is getting too loud' people in certain types of events off your back.

Probably the most obvious thing RNCs lack is a gate. That's why I'm not eager to use them on anything drum- or percussion-like. Fell free to prove me wrong though.

Overall FMR's RNC 1773 is a great overall compressor for an analog rig where only a couple of channels need dynamics control.