Recording Studio

Talk About Recording Mixer, Recording Sound card, etc.

There are a lot of netizens chatting with me about recording mixers, sound cards and other equipment. I picked the ones with high repetition and said:

1. About Mackie/Runningman

I saw that you introduced the Mackie mixer in the mic preamp and mixer chapter. I bought a ProFX series mixer/Runningman sound card. Why is the effect not as good as you said?

I am completely speechless

Friends, please read the text in its entirety. If you want to use my article as a reference, please open your eyes and observe carefully, you will find the word VLZ in my article, next to Mackie (or Runningman, the two are the same thing in China) . What it means is that if you want to buy a Mackie, you have to go to the VLZ series and don’t look elsewhere. This is important content, and I don’t know why so many readers skip it.

Is the brand right? Isn’t that all made by one company? How can you lie to me? These words come from the true heart of a reader.

If you say that, then I have something to say. The iPhone from the first generation in 2007 to the latest second generation SE is all made by the same company. Do you think that the brand is the same anyway, and you just come here with your eyes closed. One will do? ?

In fact, ProFX series and sound card series, using them for recording may directly hit your self-confidence. Objectively speaking, the VLZ series is relatively cheap, and the indicators are also good choices. As I mentioned before, the cheapest version of the VLZ, you can use it as a trifle, and it’s not impossible. Although it is very simple, except for the sound, it has no extra functions. At least this sound is above the pass line, at least it provides you with tools that can be used within one thousand yuan, which is better than what you use for Yamaha recordings. Of course, it is the level of “usable”, and the price is just that, you can’t ask for too much. Someone asked me how is it better than the Focusrite ISA ONE? Does that even need to be said? One is a few hundred yuan, one is more than 4,000 yuan, what do you think?

How much difference is that level?

Let me give you one word: “crushing”. After all, ISA is a part of several super mixers that can be counted in history. A complete channel strip is quite expensive, costing ten thousand to several thousand. The VLZ series was originally designed and positioned as an economical and applicable model, and the largest 32-channel is less than the price of a channel strip of ISA.

2. About Behringer

Some friends mentioned BEHRINGER mixer products, which are also used for recording.

There are many friends who want to get some auditions. This is there, and we’re done. I have done several articles on the mixer series, as well as other products such as microphones, DI boxes, etc. The audition is all done, you just need to find a useful earphone to listen to.

BEHRINGER’s products are typical economical models. I have a series of articles on the official account. I have tried the analog mixers of the X series and QX series, as well as the digital mixer series, as well as peripheral products such as various microphones. , sound card, DI box and other products, related comparative recordings, comments, experience, there are. For comparison, the industry standard in the audio industry, the AVID audio interface with the price in the range of 10,000-20,000 yuan. Combined with the price, as long as it is used properly, the effect can be described as amazing. Friends who are interested can go and listen to it and give you a reference.

Some friends asked me how to search for keywords on the official account, why there was no automatic reply. Because I’m all doing it myself, to be honest, I’m not very good at setting up, and I don’t have the energy to fiddle with these issues, so please go ahead by yourself for the time being. The series of articles in there are sure to have quite a few sections that will be of interest to you. Even if you are looking at the flowers in your spare time, browse and browse casually, and collect some knowledge and experience, it is better than just swiping Weibo to watch chicken soup or something. Recently, I am recruiting assistants and a number of other positions. When I recruit people in place, someone will naturally solve this series of large and small problems for me.

Closer to home, BEHRINGER can actually be used, and it is often better than Mickey. The key is that you need to know what you need: if you buy it for Summing, you need to buy an analog mixer with enough channels; if you do multitrack recording, then you need to buy one with an audio interface or a multitrack output. Digital mixer; you do audio processing, then you need to buy a digital mixer with enough DSP effects, because digital mixers only have a lot of DSP effects available. Analog consoles with effects only have very simple channel strips and send-type effects, which are far less adjustable than digital consoles.

As for the quality of the DSP effects? I just pulled it up a few days ago
@zhouyuhang
Experimented together. In order to ensure the comparison conclusion is simple and effective, we use the limiter to compress the same music material, and the variables are precisely agreed. I am using BEHRINGER’s limiter, and Zhou Yuhang is using iZotope’s “mastering tool” ozone9. It should be noted that the word mastering artifact is not what I said. You need to understand its source, and you can find it by simply searching yourself. Without further ado, here is Zhou Yuhang’s succinct conclusion:

3. About SSL

Finally, let’s talk about SSL Six.

I found that many friends, especially younger ones, didn’t know the brand of SSL, thinking it was a new brand or a small brand. Friends in the industry always make a fuss when they hear “don’t know SSL”, and I don’t think that’s surprising at all. Because traditional SSL products are high-end products, the price is usually 100,000 or millions, and the quality is basically recognized by the industry. In terms of sales, manufacturers and agents rarely advertise, or do not advertise at all, and only do engineering, because they are not intended for the mass market, and generally no one in the public will buy these things. In recent years, the music production industry has become more and more compact/personalized, so his family has also followed the trend of the times and launched a series of extremely cheap (relatively before) small products, which gradually entered the public eye. The Six is ​​basically a console with a reasonable price and enough functions. You can use it for recording and Summing. But there is one thing you should pay attention to, Six is ​​a pure analog mixer with good quality, so your audio interface must not be a short board relative to it, otherwise it will not be able to exert its quality. I saw a friend who used a thousand yuan entry-level Yamaha small sound card, and bought it back and used it on the small sound card. This is very unscientific, because the quality of Yamaha’s small sound card is so much worse. What you get like this is not the sound of the quality level of Yamaha’s small sound card? To make it easier to understand, a good sound is processed by a poor sound card, how can it still be a good sound?

So, what kind of sound card is not a shortcoming relative to SSL?

In fact, it is quite simple, the quality, or more straightforwardly, the price at least can’t be bad. Take Summing as an example. Your sound card should have at least 8 outputs. If the price of your sound card is less than 10,000 yuan, then the quality is probably not as good as that of SSL. A typical example is the 18i20 of the Focusrite scarlett series, with a price of more than 4K. In fact, it is not bad for entry, but if it is used together with Six, it is still a serious bottleneck. Take the Northeastern dialect, “I’m blind to this stage”.

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