Suggest a fairly straightforward mixer for beginners

[Mike Caldwell]

You are right DR! Also…Lotsa bad drivers out there too! You don’t have to be one .

I’m just pointing out that there are a ton of fundamentals to learn like proper mic and speaker placement, gain staging, etc that you should learn to do correctly before cutting up a room eq into a mess chasing feedback.

As a sound tech that worked as a house guy for venues and for bands I can’t count the number of bad room eq jobs that needed fixed in order to mix properly. Yes, I’d put them back to whatever goofy setup I walked in to…

Cloud rant over!

YES the fundamentals are just as important be it an analog mixer or digital, as well as understanding signal routing through a mixer.
If possible after a system install / upgrade job where they went from an analog mixer to digital sometimes I like having their analog mixer nearby to compare the controls and functions directly between the two when doing training.

 

[TomB]

You all make good points about the digital world, but all the concepts and procedures for good sound were developed long before digital technology. If an analog board were to fall into OP’s lap (and they’re easy to find), I’d suggest they could get up and running very quickly, and explore the basic tenets of stage sound management as mentioned above, then explore the digital realm better once (if) they upgrade later on. Though I work in both realms these days, I do initially find diving 4 menus deep on a club’s digital mixer to be a challenge when I have an hour to showtime. …and yes, I do rely on default settings .

 

[DWBass]

You all make good points about the digital world, but all the concepts and procedures for good sound were developed long before digital technology. If an analog board were to fall into OP’s lap (and they’re easy to find), I’d suggest they could get up and running very quickly, and explore the basic tenets of stage sound management as mentioned above, then explore the digital realm better once (if) they upgrade later on. Though I work in both realms these days, I do initially find diving 4 menus deep on a club’s digital mixer to be a challenge when I have an hour to showtime. …and yes, I do rely on default settings .

I'm much more comfortable with an analog mixer. I got pushed into getting a digital mixer! Ugh! Way too much work dealing with software on a tablet. Then you need to buy a router for better connection to the mixer. Plug and play for me. I'm glad I don't do sound anymore.

 

[micguy]

Mackie’s stuff is good solid gear. People like to attack it, but a lot of that is just because they are king of the hill when it comes to less expensive mixers

When choosing a mixer, knowing what you are going to plug into it is important - cheaper “12 channel “ mixers don’t have 12 mic pres, and some of the inputs may be paired up stereo line inputs (they count a stereo input as 2 inputs) so you usually need to buy a mixer with more “channels” than you have sources - it’s a bit tricky to figure out sometimes.

 

[Deleted member 394181]

Ill recommend this again.