If you want to hear poor limiter try Boost 11. The Spinal Tap plugin.  Yes I know there are fans of it. 

chuckebaby
There is better out there, but the Concrete limiter is a pretty nice little plug in.
I particularly liked that it was a PC module.

 Being a PC module is what makes Concrete Limiter stand out above the rest as far as I'm concerned. Sure there are better out there for many purposes and flavors, The CA2A which can be switched to limiter mode comes to mind, but that's kind of getting to the point of comparing apples to oranges.
 Either or used improperly and abused will surely trash your sound quality.
 Concrete Limiter is a very basic easy to use and very clean and nice sounding versatile gain stage module even when it's not even being used for limiting at all.
 
 I actually prefer to use it instead of cranking up the input gain (trim) of the channel in many situations, such as where I can get a great over all comfortable gain balance where there is only one or two peaks that will made the channel gain indicator flash red, than above 0.0+db digital clipping and distortion is getting through on the track, and even though you may not notice it right away during a mixing session it could cause unnecessary complications and problems during final treatment in the buss. That can kind of like throwing a curve ball at you master buss compressor's attack and release settings, and or a knuckle ball at a reverb buss's predelay and early reflection settings.
But Concrete Limiter's input gain can be increased while the output level can be set lower than 0.0 db so it can be set let everything pass through except for just the highest peaks, just make a blip on Concrete Limiter's meter, indicating the limiting threshold has been met and absorbed with no digital clipping occurring past output, and passing though a clean signal with no further compression allowing for maximum dynamic range.
 

John
If you want to hear poor limiter try Boost 11. The Spinal Tap plugin.  Yes I know there are fans of it. 

Hee, hee, The Spinal Tap plugin, great analogy John. Never thought of it quite that way, but now it's been burned into my brain, LoL
I am a bit of a fan of Boost 11, I always referred to it as a "Stomp Box Grade" plugin that "Clashes" nicely with Punk.
 

When in Sonar I always use it on all my tracks, the last insert on the ProChannel, but not necessarily for limiting. I work in track view all the time and the concrete limiter is great for using as a gain control for mixing and of course you have the limiting function in the event it does go over. 

I find all this talk of using the concrete limiter as a "Gain Control" quite puzzling.
 
It's not a gain control, it doesn't have any "Input Gain" control, it's a "Threshold Control" and as you change the "Threshold", it's adjusting the amount of compression. Nothing to do with gain, it's compression you're getting.

cliffr
I find all this talk of using the concrete limiter as a "Gain Control" quite puzzling.
 
It's not a gain control, it doesn't have any "Input Gain" control, it's a "Threshold Control" and as you change the "Threshold", it's adjusting the amount of compression. Nothing to do with gain, it's compression you're getting.

 
You only get limiting/compression if you get gain reduction....
 
Concrete Limiter As A Volume Control
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9IBJkQJoj8
 

Rasure

cliffr
I find all this talk of using the concrete limiter as a "Gain Control" quite puzzling.
 
It's not a gain control, it doesn't have any "Input Gain" control, it's a "Threshold Control" and as you change the "Threshold", it's adjusting the amount of compression. Nothing to do with gain, it's compression you're getting.

 
You only get limiting/compression if you get gain reduction....
 
Concrete Limiter As A Volume Control
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9IBJkQJoj8
 

Interesting, but even in that sense it's only useful as a "pseudo gain control" for relatively low level signals. In reality it is not a gain control at all, I see how you might use it as a "pseudo gain control" for relatively low level signals that have a limited dynamic range.  If your aim is to control the gain, then you can't beat a "Real Gain Control".  You won't get any surprises with a real gain control :-)
 
The concrete limiter is definitely not a gain control.

I have the (new) Waves L1 and to my ears the Concrete Limiter sounds better, esp in the low end. It's a 64-band compressor if I recall correctly. I use it all the time, though not as a final mastering tool - I have Ozone 8 for that..

cliffr

Rasure

cliffr
I find all this talk of using the concrete limiter as a "Gain Control" quite puzzling.
 
It's not a gain control, it doesn't have any "Input Gain" control, it's a "Threshold Control" and as you change the "Threshold", it's adjusting the amount of compression. Nothing to do with gain, it's compression you're getting.

 
You only get limiting/compression if you get gain reduction....
 
Concrete Limiter As A Volume Control
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9IBJkQJoj8
 

Interesting, but even in that sense it's only useful as a "pseudo gain control" for relatively low level signals. In reality it is not a gain control at all, I see how you might use it as a "pseudo gain control" for relatively low level signals that have a limited dynamic range.  If your aim is to control the gain, then you can't beat a "Real Gain Control".  You won't get any surprises with a real gain control :-)
 
The concrete limiter is definitely not a gain control.

AHmmmmmmmmmm, I was talking about using Concreate Limiter as a gain ""STAGE!""
Kind of look at this as one of those cool "Tips & Tricks" methods instead of another endless debate on who's right and who's wrong, then maybe you'll try it, and experience for your self how freak'in COOL it really works!
 
 
You may not be able to see the difference in volume, but you can certainly hear it with you ears as you slide the threshold fader down, it continues to raise the volume UP. And believe it or not, the gain will continue to steadily increase until something triggers the specified threshold, and the point of maximum gain staging.
 Oh yeah, anything Pseudo about Concrete Limiter would be classifying it as a Compressor.
That's clearly a novice mistake, as naïve as calling "Normalization" compression.
 
And there is no reason I've ever found  to increase volume/gain on a signal unless it was weak in the first place. Using a trim pad, or "gain" control as it's labeled in SONAR is actually designed to set level just "below 0 db at your signal peak!" What makes it vitally important to do so, especially with digital recording, being all audio is basically recorded with 1's and 0's it has no noise ceiling, so there's really nothing to stop your volume levels to go off the charts and exceed the dangerous levels.
 And not only that, the more you exceed a mic's maximum trim level (set to below 0 db) the more sensitive the mic gets, the more distorted the channel gets, and also that slight hush of your computer fans starts to turn into a raging wind storm.
 
And there are times for example when using a "trim" pot to increase gain on an acoustic guitarist playing a very soft passage accidently raps a knuckle on the guitar's sound board which can send your average SPL from -20 db up to +20 db, it is no surprise to me when it blows a driver out of a pair of prosumer headphones at best, or at worse whacks you directly in the ears at around 125db-130db with prograde headphones such as Sennheiser HD 280 Pro closed back noise canceling cans and a Rane HC6 pro headphone console cranked up loud can be painful and certainly make you legally deaf for the rest of the day. Too many overdoses of that does permanent ear damage.

Steev

cliffr

Rasure

cliffr
I find all this talk of using the concrete limiter as a "Gain Control" quite puzzling.
 
It's not a gain control, it doesn't have any "Input Gain" control, it's a "Threshold Control" and as you change the "Threshold", it's adjusting the amount of compression. Nothing to do with gain, it's compression you're getting.

 
You only get limiting/compression if you get gain reduction....
 
Concrete Limiter As A Volume Control
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9IBJkQJoj8
 

Interesting, but even in that sense it's only useful as a "pseudo gain control" for relatively low level signals. In reality it is not a gain control at all, I see how you might use it as a "pseudo gain control" for relatively low level signals that have a limited dynamic range.  If your aim is to control the gain, then you can't beat a "Real Gain Control".  You won't get any surprises with a real gain control :-)
 
The concrete limiter is definitely not a gain control.

AHmmmmmmmmmm, I was talking about using Concreate Limiter as a gain ""STAGE!""
Kind of look at this as one of those cool "Tips & Tricks" methods instead of another endless debate on who's right and who's wrong, then maybe you'll try it, and experience for your self how freak'in COOL it really works!
 
 
You may not be able to see the difference in volume, but you can certainly hear it with you ears as you slide the threshold fader down, it continues to raise the volume UP. And believe it or not, the gain will continue to steadily increase until something triggers the specified threshold, and the point of maximum gain staging.
 Oh yeah, anything Pseudo about Concrete Limiter would be classifying it as a Compressor.
That's clearly a novice mistake, as naïve as calling "Normalization" compression.
 
And there is no reason I've ever found  to increase volume/gain on a signal unless it was weak in the first place. Using a trim pad, or "gain" control as it's labeled in SONAR is actually designed to set level just "below 0 db at your signal peak!" What makes it vitally important to do so, especially with digital recording, being all audio is basically recorded with 1's and 0's it has no noise ceiling, so there's really nothing to stop your volume levels to go off the charts and exceed the dangerous levels.
 And not only that, the more you exceed a mic's maximum trim level (set to below 0 db) the more sensitive the mic gets, the more distorted the channel gets, and also that slight hush of your computer fans starts to turn into a raging wind storm.
 
And there are times for example when using a "trim" pot to increase gain on an acoustic guitarist playing a very soft passage accidently raps a knuckle on the guitar's sound board which can send your average SPL from -20 db up to +20 db, it is no surprise to me when it blows a driver out of a pair of prosumer headphones at best, or at worse whacks you directly in the ears at around 125db-130db with prograde headphones such as Sennheiser HD 280 Pro closed back noise canceling cans and a Rane HC6 pro headphone console cranked up loud can be painful and certainly make you legally deaf for the rest of the day. Too many overdoses of that does permanent ear damage.

Well, I didn't classify it as a compressor, nor am I a novice or naive. It's a limiter, and the threshold slider controls the level at which compression begins to kick in.
 
I said I found calling it a gain control puzzling. Because ... well it's not a gain control.
I understand how you're talking about using it, which may be cool, but doesn't make it a gain or volume control.  Yes you may use it to apply some gain, but there are other effects there, namely limiting and compression, which you are obviously aware of and taking advantage of in the scenarios you describe.
 
However, to call it a gain or volume control, or use instead of a gain or volume control, it isn't, it's a limiter and functions quite differently. Therefore, to use it as, and call it a volume control or gain control, it's quite correct to call it a "pseudo gain control". I really don't understand why that seems to get such a reaction.

boost 11 was bad.
concrete limiter is a great, invisible limiter, but my mixes/masters are already very loud and controlled by the time they get there (via tape saturation and bus compression plugins)
I never add more than 5db when using it.  Usually between 2 and 3, actually.
 
The concrete limiter catching the remaining transients and dynamics is fine- even for a final master.