I found an old grey Ross Compressor in my studio that I must have bought when I was 10.
My question is does anyone know what exactly has to be done to this box to make it a little quieter during high gain situations?
It is very quiet on everything from clean to medium gain. But if I play high gain either with my Engl 580, 530, VHT Valvulator, 3+SE, or modded JMP 1, it gets noisy.
Anyone know what Keeley does to these to quiet them down a notch.
I can easily do a true bypass mod, but that will not help at all since I use it in a switching system.
Thanks

I wouldn't modify that compressor. It is very valuable. Having owned several "boutique" compressors, they all are noisy to an extent. Nature of the beast.

Sub the transistors for 2n5088, they will be much quieter.

hello there, you can replace most of the resistors with metal film types and this will reduce the noise as well replacing the transistors with 2n5088's as suggested. rh

I second leaving it alone because of its value. If nothing else sell it and buy a Keeley or Analog Man comp.

I have an old Ross Compressor that really sounds great. A friend of mine had two of them and gave one to me. The only catch with the one I have is that the original grey paint job is gone and has been replaced with a (very nice at that) pro redone black matte finish instead. I love the compressor but I find I don't use it as much as I should. I am thinking about selling it. It is 100% original otherwise and sounds great.

Sell it and get the Keeley..it's dead quiet...