I recently bought an Carvin XP1000L and through I would give it a review. This is to be a replacement for my Yamaha EMX88S. It will mainly be used for small bar gigs. The EMX88S is good enough, but I wanted gain controls and the ability to use speakons.
Initial Thoughts
The mixer is light, very light. It is also very compact. They use smaller knobs and zig zag them to get the size down. The knobs feel a bit flimsy, although the light weight could be giving a slight physiological feeling of flimsiness. However, the gain knob on the first channel is not straight so it rubs a bit when you turn it which doesn't help.
And speaking of knobs, I wish they had used larger knobs for the gains. And a larger knob for the main volume, but this will probably become less of an issue as I get used to the mixer.
First Gig
The first gig was a real trial by fire and not typical of the gigs I would normally use it for. It was a four band, four genre night. The venue holds 250 and had two levels. (It actually has three, but we did not use the third.)
The biggest problem was I didn't have enough channels. This isn't the mixers fault, but when looking at the mixer I overlooked that the two stereo channels do not have gain controls
It seems that the stereo channels want a very low input. I had to keep juggling channels to find things that would work in the stereo inputs. For example, I could use my bass amp for three of the bands since it has a DI level. But the other band had a GK with no level on the DI and was way too hot.
I noticed no distortion on the stereo channels, even when the peak lights where solid red. So it looks like you can push them.
The mixer had more than enough oomph for the gig.
Miscellaneous
I did not pay much attention to the effects. I threw a bit of reverb on the vocals and left it at that. I would like to mess around with them more.
The USB connector is a nice feature. I put a cheap USB light in it and it really helped, especially since I am new to this mixer. I tried to buy the USB light from Carvin since it seemed to be good quality, but they wanted $36 shipping for a $12 item
So watch those shipping charges.
I didn't get to use the music break switch since I had to keep two mics live at all times, but I used the equivalent on the Yamaha all the time at gigs and was really happy that the Carvin has the same feature.
The Carvin has a true 48V phantom power supply, the Yamaha doesn't. I needed it to run some of my active DIs that the Yamaha cannot power.
Overall
For a small bar band mixer the Carvin is small, light, and has a very nice feature set at a very good price! It probably has too much power, but I can live with that
Initial Thoughts
The mixer is light, very light. It is also very compact. They use smaller knobs and zig zag them to get the size down. The knobs feel a bit flimsy, although the light weight could be giving a slight physiological feeling of flimsiness. However, the gain knob on the first channel is not straight so it rubs a bit when you turn it which doesn't help.
And speaking of knobs, I wish they had used larger knobs for the gains. And a larger knob for the main volume, but this will probably become less of an issue as I get used to the mixer.
First Gig
The first gig was a real trial by fire and not typical of the gigs I would normally use it for. It was a four band, four genre night. The venue holds 250 and had two levels. (It actually has three, but we did not use the third.)
The biggest problem was I didn't have enough channels. This isn't the mixers fault, but when looking at the mixer I overlooked that the two stereo channels do not have gain controls
It seems that the stereo channels want a very low input. I had to keep juggling channels to find things that would work in the stereo inputs. For example, I could use my bass amp for three of the bands since it has a DI level. But the other band had a GK with no level on the DI and was way too hot.
I noticed no distortion on the stereo channels, even when the peak lights where solid red. So it looks like you can push them.
The mixer had more than enough oomph for the gig.
Miscellaneous
I did not pay much attention to the effects. I threw a bit of reverb on the vocals and left it at that. I would like to mess around with them more.
The USB connector is a nice feature. I put a cheap USB light in it and it really helped, especially since I am new to this mixer. I tried to buy the USB light from Carvin since it seemed to be good quality, but they wanted $36 shipping for a $12 item
So watch those shipping charges.I didn't get to use the music break switch since I had to keep two mics live at all times, but I used the equivalent on the Yamaha all the time at gigs and was really happy that the Carvin has the same feature.
The Carvin has a true 48V phantom power supply, the Yamaha doesn't. I needed it to run some of my active DIs that the Yamaha cannot power.
Overall
For a small bar band mixer the Carvin is small, light, and has a very nice feature set at a very good price! It probably has too much power, but I can live with that
