Allen & Heath budget digital mixer - coming soon!

[dbuckley]

Software is always free. Its free because in the absolute form it doesn't exist other than as a set of values on some storage media, be it on disk, a USB stick, or the memory of a computer or digital mixer.

 

In reality, when software changes hands, there is often a price paid for that changing of hands, and it is often a value in excess of the media it is transported on, but that doesn't change the underlying principle.

 

This situation with digital mixers is very different to an anlogue mixer.

 

Almost any digital mixer will have enough spare DSP power to add (for example) a matrix. Its just a bit of multiplication and addition, truly trivial stuff, plus a bit of a GUI, and maybe attaching the levels and pans to existing physical assignable knobs, and getting the outputs to physical outputs instead of what went theere before. And once the code is written, the additional costs of adding that feature to each mixer going out the factory door is zero.

 

Contrast that to the cost of adding a matrix to an analogue mixer. Electronics and panel space are required, and there will be an additional cost to every mixer that goes out the factory door.

 

Thus when you see that a LS9 doesn't have DCAs, that isn't for cost reasons; adding DCAs is another trivial exercise, albeit you'd need to repurpose the MIDI fader level or something to get the controls. Theres no DCAs because of market segmentation. Thats very diofferent to a GL2x and the GL4x series which (if memopry serves!) do have VCAs.

[paulears]

This could be just what Behringer need. Nobody nowadays would understand Skoda jokes, the ones around when I was a teenager, when the brand was a joke. Now it's a very different feel. Established names and 'lesser know/respected brands" can work together. Behringer sitting with KT, and Cadac with Soundking. Even Robe did it with lighting - an ex-Eastern Block manufacturer of essentially copies turning into a company worthy of their position. Behringer have been eating away at their unreliable/'stolen' chip on the shoulder for a long time. Their problem with the Mackie 8 bus mixers was when? the 90's? Many users are not even aware of the troubled past.

 

If the X32 is as good as the hype - I'd buy one. I buy products to do particular jobs and wouldn't have any issues with buying one - and I'd probably buy it from out German friends for the 3 year warranty. I note they sell many brands written off here in the UK as unreliable and dreadful in some way - yet they continue to market them and support them with long free guarantees. If they were trouble, then at the low margins they operate on, they'd dump them like a shot - wouldn't they?

[mervaka]

[Matrices are] just a bit of multiplication and addition

 

To be a pedant, they're just addition :) Matrices are just a sum of one or more buses.

 

 

 

[MarkPAman]

Shirley a sum of a potion of one or more busses, thus requiring some multiplication?

[themadhippy]

thus requiring some multiplication

but muliplication is only a posh name for addition, 2 x 3 is the same as 2+2+2

[mervaka]

if you're including the faders, then yes, sorry :)

[DrummerJonny]

"distinctly analogue price..."

 

Any speculation on what this may be? As a ballpark figure? under £10k?

[smalljoshua]

A T112 with IDR32 can be had for less than 10K list.

 

Looking at their small-medium analogues, a GL2800 32Ch comes in at about 2.5K +VAT list. If it's a distinctly analogue price, and also (as has been assumed here) is aimed as an X32 competitor. I'll take a bet at it being about 2.6-2.8K list +VAT.

 

Josh

[DrummerJonny]

Nice!

Assuming your speculation is good, and the mixer itself meets my expectations, might have to get me one of these.

 

Was looking at the Si Compact, but I had a play at PLASA and just wasn't too impressed. Can't wait to see how this fares.

[jjsound]

Hello,

 

This is my first post.

 

Being excited about the "teaser" AH showed, I hope this mixer is all it shall be cranked up to be. If the price is right, it has digital snake, personal monitor mixers (also at a good price) some local I/O for my effects boxes, I am sold. With Behringer dangling vaporware for more than a year now I am fatigued waiting. Will the X32 be supported by the same mentality like other Behringer gear?

 

I hope the same network is available for the new board as the other AH mixers. I'll understand if the support is a bit curtailed as these will not be high profit items.

 

I am a small fish in the audio pond but I do run 24 wireless mic channels and 8 channels of orchestra during musicals. I rely on good scene recalls. I use a Yamaha 01V now but the analog snake gets unwieldy. I sometimes need two.

 

Happy New Year.

 

John

 

 

[Biro]

This Appeared today:

 

 

http://www.allen-heath.com/UK/Products/pages/ProductsListing.aspx?CatId=GLDSeries

 

 

 

Allen & Heath will unveil GLD, a user-friendly, cost effective and scalable live digital mixing system, conceptually based on the hugely successful digital iLive series, later this month. A standard GLD 32 input system offers 28 XLR mic inputs with plug n’ play I/O expanders allowing easy expansion up to 48 inputs (44 XLR mic inputs).

At the heart of the system is the GLD-80 mixer, providing 48 input processing channels, 8 stereo FX returns fed by iLive’s acclaimed FX emulations, 30 configurable buses, 20 mix processing channels, and DSP power to provide full processing without compromise.

GLD-80 has an analogue-style channel processing control section complemented by a graphical 8.4 inch touch screen. A fully-customisable drag ‘n drop layout allows quick and easy assignment of inputs and mixes to fader strips. There are 20 fader strips in 4 layers, each with motorised fader, a channel LCD display which can be named and colour-coded, plus a rotary control for direct access to gain, pan and aux/FX sends. The mixer‘s local I/O comprises 4 XLR mic/line inputs, 4 XLR line outs, 4 RCA inputs, 2 RCA outputs, and digital outputs in SPDIF and AES3 formats.

 

The GLD-80 connects to a range of plug ‘n play I/O racks to ‘build’ 28, 36 or 44 mic input systems. A primary AR2412 rack (24 XLR inputs, 12 XLR outs) and up to two AR84 expander racks (8 XLR inputs, 4 XLR outs each) can be connected over 120m CAT5 runs using A&H’s dSNAKE protocol. dSNAKE provides control to the remote preamp, and all mic preamps are scene recallable. AR2412 also includes a connection for personal monitoring systems.

 

GLD has the ability to record and playback a stereo signal on a USB memory stick. Standard iLive audio I/O option cards for Dante, MADI, EtherSound and Allen & Heath's ACE protocols can be fitted, allowing multi-channel record/playback, FOH/monitor splits, and connection to A&H iLive systems, which can easily be configured using GLD's extensive soft-patching.

 

“Designing a system which is suitable for both the professional engineer and occasional user has been a priority. With GLD, our aim was to take much of the complexity out of digital mixing, opening up the tremendous benefits of digital technology to a wider group of customers, such as the rental companies, houses of worship and live venues where our GL series analogue mixers have been working so successfully for years,” comments A&H MD, Glenn Rogers. “GLD offers high quality processing and stunning sonic performance. Key to the system is GLD’s remote plug ’n play I/O audio racks for flexible, easy set-up system building.”

[Simon Lewis]

And - according to a different e-mail - all Allen & Heath UK distribution will now be through Audio Technica...

[david.elsbury]

Does it look like it's possible to run 2 surfances off the same set of preamps/input racks? (As in, a FOH and a MON console sharing inputs? It's a bit hard for me to make out with the provided info.

 

David

 

Edit: Having read the brochure, what you do is purchase one full set, (surface + IP racks) and then another surface, and 2 of the A+H "ACE" cards which do the linking up to 64ch.

 

Also, if you want the full channel count on stage, you have to have 2 cat5 lines running back to the mixer, you can't daisy chain all off the one.

 

Still looks pretty darn good though!

:)

[chelgrian]

Allen & Heath will unveil GLD, a user-friendly, cost effective and scalable live digital mixing system, conceptually based on the hugely successful digital iLive series, later this month. A standard GLD 32 input system offers 28 XLR mic inputs with plug n’ play I/O expanders allowing easy expansion up to 48 inputs (44 XLR mic inputs).

 

Presumably no word on price yet. Also has anyone teased out what the differences between this system and a iLive T80 plus say an iDR-32 or iDR-48 are?

[mervaka]

what sort of differences are you thinking? looking at the option card slot, it seems likely the DSP is in the surface.