Choosing The Board

[p3schwa]

Hi.

My head's spinning, so I thought I'd get your opinion.

We're buying a new board, 16ish channel.

So far we've tried a Yamaha 01V 96, Mackie Onyx 1640, and possible gonna try an A&H Mix Wizard3.

It's gonna be used for band work, small venues etc.

What would you go for??????????????

Really liked the Mackie, not too keen on the digital Yamaha, but I'd like to know more about the A&H.

Opinions please!

[Bobbsy]

Well, you're not really comparing like with like on your shortlist.

 

Personally, I'd go for the 01V96. Being a digital board there's a way steeper learning curve but once you get your head around all it can do and start to use all the features you begin to wonder how you did without them. Don't forget that, for the price, the Yammy is giving you pretty much all the outboard processing you could possibly need...and allows this to be controlled on presets. Having made the move from analogue to digital for my personal boards about 18 months ago, I now find it hard to go back to analogue!

 

Of the two analogue boards you mention, I have to say I'm NOT a fan of Mackie for live work. I've never found them particularly reliable and don't like the brittle sound of their mic preamps or the rather unmusical EQ. Their PR department, being aware of this, is making big play of the changes they've made in the Onyx series but I'm still not happy with it.

 

Allen & Heath, on the other hand, is an excellent board for the money. The sound is warm and musical, the EQ section easy to get nice sound out of....and they're reliable in a live sound/road environment. Should something go wrong, A&H also have a good customer service department that, in my experience, goes out of their way to be helpful.

 

Hope this helps

 

Bob

[Simon Lewis]

Bobbsy has it sussed....

 

The A&H is an excellent desk - it's a small professional desk rather than a large semi-pro/amateur desk.

 

I'm most comfortable with this because I do not use digital desks regularly. If a variety of people are to use the mixer, the A&H will be the easiest to use. However, the bells and whistles on the Yamaha are very good, and will replace a rack full of outboard. You will need to sit down and learn this interface though. There's a bit of a cost difference as well....

 

Simon

[andy_s]

we've got a mixwizard 3 as our rehearsal desk, and they are really well designed desks - for the money I don't think anything can beat it. I don't know the yamaha, but if you want digital for live band work at a sensible budget (albeit a lot more than your onyx and 01V96) I could recommend the Mackie TT24 - around £5K stirling for a 24 channel desk designed for live work.

[Bobbsy]

I think £5K is a rather different price point than the OP was talking about, but for a digital board in that range I would (and did!) go with the Yamaha DM1000 rather than the Mackie. I've heard okay comments about the TT24 but I have a major personal prejudice against Mackie mixers...which applies to both analogue and digital. Anybody else who had the misfortune to try and do a show on their Digital 8 Bus fiasco will understand my "once bitten twice shy" philosophy when it comes to the words Mackie and Digital in the same sentence!

 

Bob

[Mr.Si]

Hi there,

 

I'm glad you mentioned the MixWizard, as that's the desk I'd immediately opt for myself.

I've never used an 01v96 or any of the other digital desks, but I have heard of many people loving the model you mention anmd having high productivity from it.

But I guess that, even though the world is more and more going over to digital, if the mixer is going to be changing hands with lots of engineers going to be using it, then maybe it's not such a good idea as yet.

 

The only view I can have a proper view on, is the A&H and when I used it, I loved it. so packed with features and not compromised in quality either.

 

The only Mackie desk I've used is one of those VLZ desks which I don;t know if they still make. I personally don't like the layout of their desks of which I am acquainted with, - having the aux at the top, then eq later down the strip. But that's just personal opinion. And their smaller desks have usually only got 60mm faders which again is just an annoyance really.

 

Si

[andy_s]

Hello bobbsy- . we did look at the DM1000, but I wasn't keen for a couple of reasons - I didn't like the layout - too small and cramped for my liking. Now if I could have afforded the DM2000, (at 3 x the price) or PM5D (at 6 x the price), I might have gone down the yamaha route. the second reason was simplicity - we have a team of non specialists here, so I was keen to find a sound desk the flyman could operate when necessary! We've done half a dozen theatre shows on the TT24s now, and it's done everything we've needed, from simple to complicated, without too much trouble. I'm sure the DM1000 would have coped as well, but at the end of the day it's horses for courses.

 

I agree about the price point - my (implicit) point was that if you want to go digital, don't look for something that costs the same as a mixwizard,especially if it wasn't designed for live band work....but the mixwizard I'd say would serve people a lot better than other desks in that price bracket, digital or analogue.

[Bobbsy]

Hi Andy,

 

I'll freely admit that my prejudice against Mackie digital is just that...prejudice. However it's based on six of the worst months I've ever spent trying to get the #@!% D8B console to perform as it was supposed to! From what I hear the TT24 is a different kettle of fish, but I know Yamaha consoles well and therefore had a somewhat easier learning curve than I would have with something new. Two other considerations I had were: the small size which has been an actual advantage when negotiating with producers to block seats FOH and the fact that quite a few freelancers are now "Yammy Savvy".

 

Of course at yet the NEXT tranche of cost, there's now the M7CL!

 

I do tend to agree that in THIS case the Mix Wizard may be the way to go. I'm a major fan of digital IF somebody has the time to learn the console really well and get the best of the offered features. However, I fully acknowledge that it's quicker and easier to find your way around an analogue board...indeed, being au fait with analogue makes the learning curve on digital far easier (and helps you appreciate the flexibility you'll be buying!).

 

Bob

[andy_s]

the small size which has been an actual advantage when negotiating with producers to block seats FOH and the fact that quite a few freelancers are now "Yammy Savvy".

 

Bob

 

 

We had the luxury of being able to insist on (and specify the size of) our front-of-house mixing position at the design stage of our new theatre - the idea of choice between seats or mixer was firmly jumped on right from the beginning! But for the mobile sound designer or engineer, the space saving makes complete sense - both from the lugging around of kit point of view and the financial one.

 

I've very little experience of digital in action, as my practical mixing days are mostly behind me now, (and were firmly in the analogue realm, to be honest), but for the odd event where I've filled in because the technicians have already done too much in overtime, I've found the transition to digital easier than I'd expected......

 

like other people here, I've never been a big fan of mackie analogue desks and no experience of their other digital mixing products, but I've become quite fond of our two TT24s......