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Help me find a mixer.

Hector_G

Hector_G

Apr 6, 2009
545
60
El Paso, Texas
www.myspace.com
#1
I'm hoping someone here will know the answer or at least point me in the right direction.

I'm trying to start a new project and I'm in need of some advice.

I'm gonna be playing solo with the aid of drum machines, loopers, keyboards and the like. (kinda like Squarepusher)

I'm buying a Kaoss pad and want to use it to place effects on some of these things.
Thing is, I need a mixer with dedicated auxiliary effects sends and returns. Also, I need a mixer that has an aux. effects mix for the individual channels.
So I can have the Kaoss pad effect the sound of, say, channel one drum machine while leaving the keyboards in channel two unaffected.
Know what I mean?

I'm gonna be using a drum machine in one channel, CD player in another, keyboards in another, Kaossilator on another and a microphone.

The mixers I've seen so far have on aux. effects mix knob that will affect every single channel.

So anyone have any recommendations? Or know of another forum I can possibly get some answers on?
Thanks.
 
#4
Hector_G said:
So anyone have any recommendations? Or know of another forum I can possibly get some answers on?
Thanks.
Click to expand...

Link Removed

Do a search there first, don't just post immediately.;)

Edit: I do something similar to what you're talking about. My board has 6 auxes, and if you know what you're doing you can have quite few independent EFX chains going simultaneously.
 
#5
Passinwind said:
Link Removed

Do a search there first, don't just post immediately.;)

Edit: I do something similar to what you're talking about. My board has 6 auxes, and if you know what you're doing you can have quite few independent EFX chains going simultaneously.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the link. That place seems quite intimidating. Oh where to start..

What kind of board do you use? I'd be quite interested in doing some research.
 
#6
Hector_G said:
Thanks for the link. That place seems quite intimidating. Oh where to start..

What kind of board do you use? I'd be quite interested in doing some research.
Click to expand...

Crest XR-20. I do a duo with a live drummer, and play fretless BG, EUB, guitar, and guitar synth.

The whole Prosoundweb site can be kind of intimidating, I agree. Start with the the Study Hall, and try browsing a few different forums to get a feel with which ones are most relevant to your situation. ;)
 
#9
T-Bird said:
Hi.

There was a thread about monitor (foldback) consoles a while back and it seems that there's even some budget ones now.

With clever routing those will accomplish what You're seeking.

Some recording consoles may fill the need also.

What's Your budget BTW?

Regards
Sam
Click to expand...

Monitor consoles huh? I'll look into those as well. I've been sitting at work for the past couple of days thinking endlessly on ways to cleverly route everything. But in the end, I figure it would be so much easier to have those dedicated aux. loops and channel mixes.

Since I haven't really found anything to compare pricing with, I figured I wasn't going to spend more than $350 on a 4 or 5 channel mixer.
 
#12
I think I've found a mixer for my needs.

Thanks everyone for their advice.
Passinwind, the mixer that you use looks great, but a bit much for my needs.

And realbadgroove, again, have what I need, but more channels than I really need.

The mixer I found has 4 mono channels and 4 stereo channels.
The perfect amount of channels for me.
Invalid Link Removed
Looks good so far. Aux. effects send with stereo returns.
Each channel has the aux. effects blend knobs.
Small enough. I think I like it.

If anyone can find something that I might be missing, (positive or negative) please speak now, or forever hold your peace. Or until I buy the thing and I find it totally doesn't do what I want it to do and I whine and complain and try to ship it back all while being mocked.
 
#13
Did you notice that the mixer isn't available until Dec 1st? Mackie is having financial difficulties I would be leary about buying anything from them right now. I use to own a mackie cfx16 and it was POS in my opinion. The effects sucked and the gain structure was terrible . I was always running out of headroom. I bought one of these http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.com/product/Peavey-PV10-Mixer?sku=631368 This mixer is a great buy for the money Plenty of headroom,good EQ and usable effects. It has pretty much the same features as the Mackie you are looking at and is cheaper. On the musicians friend website the mackie you are looking at isn't even available until Dec 31st. EDIT- Just noticed that the mackie has the USB option. Peavey offers this http://pro-audio.musiciansfriend.com/product/Peavey-PV-10-USB-NonPowered-Mixer-?sku=630123 costs $20.00 more than the mackie.
 
#14
i've been doing what the op talks about for quite a few years, and toured with quite a few small footprint mixers including behringer, mackie, peavey and soundcraft. you could spend around 150 bucks on a clean, used mackie 1202 vlz and have a basic, solid mixer. or if you want faders a 1402 vlz for a few more bucks. for me, the mackies have held up with dub style abuse the best... they don't have the most versatile eq, but give you 2 aux and are built solid (although this makes them heavy). the sealed pots put up with sweat, dirt and liquids well. plenty of routing options, too. never had any luck with cheap built in effects, personally.
my .02
 
#15
D.A.R.K. said:
i've been doing what the op talks about for quite a few years, and toured with quite a few small footprint mixers including behringer, mackie, peavey and soundcraft. you could spend around 150 bucks on a clean, used mackie 1202 vlz and have a basic, solid mixer.
Click to expand...

+1

I used a 1202VLZ happily for many years myself for this sort of application.
 
#18
Dual sweepable mids are a must. This rules out Mackie (except the Onyx).

The Allen & Heath MixWiz is the most affordable decently made solution. Now on version 3, version 1 can be had for $500. A side benefit is that unlike Mackies (except the Onyx) and most others, the MixWiz is easy (and thus cheap) to repair owing to it having individual circuit boards instead of one.

The Crest XR is a step up from the MW1 and MW2. I don't know about its ease of repair. The larger Crest board was very problematic - I don't know if this trickled down to the XR. For most folks, the extra cost of the XR is not justified.

At the top is the APB Dynasonics. Again, the cost is not justified for most folks.

In short, just get a used MizWiz. (Except for version 1, there's the bonus of onboard effects.)
 

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