Best Mixing Desk for a Home Studio

Audio Equipment Mixing Consoles
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I conducted plenty of research before finally pulling the trigger on a new mixing desk.

I discovered, on my journey, that mixing desks are actually known as mixing boards in the United States. This is helpful to know as, when asking colleagues in America for ideas, I got photo links to products like these:

studio-desk.jpg498×335 29.5 KB

No, I don’t want a studio desk I want a mixing board (or mixing desk as I would say) :rofl:

I looked into plenty of premium suppliers like Allen & Heath. These boards were amazing, on the more expensive side, but looked good and had rave reviews about the quality of sound. Thanks to Renna McDonagh who pointed me towards considering the ZED-14.

I didn’t like that these were all USB 1.1 connections and you just get a basic stereo mix out (not all the channels on separate outputs). Everything else looked fine to me and I did discover their newer ZEDi range with USB 2.0 but only volume knobs and I wanted nice clean faders on my desk.

I also passed by Behringer and Alesis on my way. Alesis seemed to have a good product but again the USB connector was not up to scratch. Some of their models also seemed to have been discontinued too.

Finally, I found one I fell in love :heart: with - the Soundcraft Signature 12 MTK.

mixing-desk-home-studio.jpg5184×2912 699 KB

This has 12 outputs and 14 inputs to your multitrack DAW. A dream for those big sessions in Adobe Audition CC. I also liked these aspects of the 12 MTK:

  • Sweeping mid range EQ.
  • The on board FX are much better than I expected (usable!)
  • 3 AUX outputs for live streaming and mix-minus possibilities.
  • dbx limiters. I already love my dbx 286s!
  • My first ever mixing desk was a Soundcraft so I knew audio quality would be great.

How about you? Are you using a mixing desk? Do you want or need one?

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I myself don’t use a live analogue mixing desk because I don’t do live recording.

I do post production music mixing and editing and my need is a Control Surface with motorised faders and some transport controls and shortcut buttons. Saves a lot of mouse dragging of volume faders, panning, EQ, Mute, Solo, sends etc.

Recording automation using the faders instead of fiddly mouse dragging is a great time-saver also.

I use the Mackie MCU Pro Control Surface and it has served me well.

David.

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Hello Mike,

I use an analogue mixer in my chain,it’s an inexpensive board, my setup is a s follows

Behringer Xenyx X2442USB
Mbox 3 Audio interface
Electro Voice RE27N/D
EDIROL MA 7A / 30 WATTS ACTIVE MONITORS
Sennheiser HD280PRO Headphone
Adobe Audition 5.0 (hoping to upgrade to AU CC soon)

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Thinking of buying a new mixer. My old Yamaha MG12/4 is not a USB one. If I get the newer version which is a USB, would it be seen as a soundcard? I use the mixer al one with Traktor for my radio shows and just wondered if anyone new if deck A and deck B from Traktor would see a new USB mixer as a soundcard?

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This one

https://www.thomann.de/ie/mackie_profx16v2.htm?glp=1&gclid=CjwKCAjw2NvLBRAjEiwAF98GMeNSI5e3i5oqr9Byr-vgaR711GYPUpm8AjhdvcBpynLqiEhPznGRZhoCXskQAvD_BwE

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You can still send audio out into it as usual.
The computer should see the mixer via USB input/output.

Prefer Virtual DJ for spinning.

Cheers,
Ben

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cheers Ben. Appreciate this

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When I was looking at mixers a couple years back, I was advised of the downturn in quality of the Mackie mixers. I had heard of a high pitch whine coming from the mixer while I use. Mackie aside, a usb mixer will be seen as a sound device on your computer. Make sure it is a USB 2.0 mixer. Some of the earlier smaller cheaper usb 1.1 mixers only sent the two track stereo mix to the pc.

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Hi David. I was price bound and wanted to give some love to a much underrated company, Behringer so I bought this a few weeks ago.

It has everything I need at the moment, and for a very reasonable price USB out is well supported on my Macbook Pro.
Cheers
Damon

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Did you get sorted @David

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hi Cado - for the time being I will stick with my Yamaha MG12. It is a brilliant mixer with very good pre’s it’s only set back is not having an integrated audio interface. But, I’m lucky enough to have a spare 2i4 which I use instead

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Whatever it takes to make Buddy sound great.

Keep Swinging.

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Hey Mike, does the 12MTK have ¼" inserts?

I would love the benefits of multitrack (I have a Mackie ProFX12 now and really love my Behringer Multicom Pro-XL Compressor/Limiter/Gate (especially love that gate functionality!)) but don’t see them on the unit nor listed anywhere in their User Manual.

Thanks!
Jason

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You can use AUX to send signal to compressor and return it back.

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It certainly does have ¼" inserts and like @Saba mentions you can use AUX 1 or AUX 2 to send the signal back to your Behringer.

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A post was split to a new topic: Dbx 286s as Master Effect for Multiple Audio Channels