In 2008 we brought a mastering engineer's dream to the world, the MANLEY BACKBONE mastering insert switcher. This unit is the centerpiece of a mastering system allowing precise control and manipulation of up to eight pieces of outboard gear.

A little history: Since our earliest days, we were commissioned to build many custom mastering consoles. But as we know, custom design work is both expensive and time consuming so we drew upon our experience to create a new stock production Mastering Insert Processor, the Manley BACKBONE.

The MANLEY BACKBONE accepts up to three balanced SOURCE INPUTS, selectable on the left side. LEFT & RIGHT can be reversed and ABSOLUTE POLARITY can be flipped. The 24 position INPUT & OUTPUT GAINS can be switched active or left passive. Up to EIGHT INSERTS can be switched in or bypassed. A SUM - DIFFERENCE MS MATRIX can be addressed between inserts 2 and 3. The order of inserts 4 & 5 can be SWAPPED. There is an injection point between inputs 7 & 8 to allow for several functions on the 3-Function MIX - FADE output control. You can mix in the DIFFERENCE signal from the input. This mixes in some out of phase signal from the input to the output in order to widen the image if desired. OR you can mix in a parallel signal in between inserts 7 & 8. A lot of folks run a reverb or parallel compressor in this fashion. OR you can use the knob as a FADER to make smooth and accurate level fades with the Penny & Giles rotary fader.

The MANLEY BACKBONE was available with ELCO or DB25 connectors for the INSERTS I/O. The 2024 revival production run were all produced as DB25 units. Cables for either system are not included and must be custom made or ordered.

For ELCO-fitted Backbones, we recommend going through Rapcohorizon. They do excellent work, are very dependable, and we've already worked out a product number for the BACKBONE ELCO snakes.

Pricing for the RAPCO supplied custom ELCO cables are:

Part # MANLEY-Insert-A-4 (4 ft) MSRP: $469.00

Part # MANLEY-Insert-B-4 (4 ft) MSRP: $469.00

Part # MANLEY-Insert-A-10 (10 ft) MSRP: $498.00

Part # MANLEY-Insert-B-10 (10 ft) MSRP: $498.00

These snakes use an EDAC (interfaces with ELCO) female with screw, 4 ft or 10 ft in length to 8 XLR-M/8 XLR-F wired and labeled according to the diagram in the BACKBONE manual. Snake "A" covers channels 1-4 and snake "B" covers channels 5-8.