I’ve had my eye on the LR-16 for a few months. Does it absolutely need insert cables or will standard TS cables work with it? It’s a great idea to be able to use insert cables but my setup isn’t like that at the moment, and the purchase of specialty cables (or the time spent making them) seems to be a bit of a dealbreaker at the moment…
On another note, does anyone have an extensive demo of the k-mix’s reverb? I’d like to know if I could get away with using it live. I’m guessing it’s no quadraverb…
Also worth noting that with the Soundcraft MTK range is that you can’t record the FX when multi-tracking over USB. Could be a bit annoying.
Out of all things that’s good with the K-mix, the reverb is definitely not one of them, in my book. It’s a matter of taste… perhaps, but it sounds to me like it’s got many small grains of delay like reverbs echoing. For sharp sudden sounds it becomes very “spray echo like”, if there is such a thing. For long pad like sounds you can probably get away with it. I find it not suitable for vocals, but perhaps it’s useful for some things. I got myself a Blusky from strymon. It’s beautiful. You can’t compare it to the K-Mix. Although the K-mix has recently been updated. I haven’t checked if they’ve changed the reverb.
This is just my personal taste, ok. After all, I am using it as my main interface and mixer. I do like it. But there are two standout issues that I don’t like. 1. The reverb quality. 2. The low output (line level). Usually mixers are like +30dB out or something. This is line level. A bit on the low side for some monitors, and high Ohm headphones.
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The Soundcraft MTK is surprisingly good at what it does, if unsurprisingly a bit flimsily constructed (knobs feel cheap). As stated, the effects don’t have a dedicated channel over USB, but the routing is very flexible and you can always route the fx return through one of the stereo pairs and track that instead.
I bought the 22MTK as a temporary stand-in while I restore my old TAC Scorpion and I intended to use it only as a standalone mixer. However, I was quite pleased at the flexibility and sound quality of the board. My main interface is a MOTU 1248 AVB which has high-spec’ed converters and is wildly flexible and I have some nice outboard pres, dynamics and fx (Chandler TG2, Urei LA3A, Eventides). However, I have done tracks solely with the MTK - even the onboard pres - and have no qualms about including them side-by-side on the same album as songs produced with the higher-end stuff.
My only real complaints (other than the flimsy knobs) about the MTK:
1: No power switch - I use line conditioners, so don’t need a power switch - but it is a miserly omission.
2: No inserts - My biggest gripe about it. I deal with it by using the groups and bringing the processed signals back in on an unused channel. This is kind of a drag. 22 channels isn’t much in my studio, so I am not nuts about sacrificing those channels. However, you get what you pay for. If you aren’t going to be using a lot of outboard dynamics or EQs, it won’t be a problem for you.
3: Reduced signal level on the recorded tracks coming back out of the DAW over USB. This was a design choice in order to allow headroom for added EQ on mixdown. Okay, I get that - it is an entry level mixer and it can help prevent overloading. However, I wish this had been left up to the user to deal with. This is the complaint I hear voiced the most. However, I can live with it and it hasn’t prevented me from doing some excellent mixes on this little board. It helps to set up the gain so that tracking levels are as hot as possible without distorting and normalize the tracks once you’ve got 'em in the DAW (in other words, standard practice for good recordings regardless of what gear is used). One thing to note: you really gotta crank the gain pots with some microphones, but the pres are quiet and can handle it.
It’s a good buy, offering a lot of mixing and routing for the money. The effects are decent, the pres won’t let you down (even if they are nothing to write home about) and I’ve even used the built-in dbx limiters to tame some wayward spiky levels (I’m lookin’ at you, Machinedrum!). If you use plugins, you can run them as inserts - a nice bonus! Latency figures are excellent.
It’s not perfect and clearly built to a price point, but the trade-offs are well chosen. It is an analog board, so no automation, recall, or anything else that a good digital board like the Qu series can offer, but the price is hard to beat. In fact, it does the job so well that I have been procrastinating restoring the TAC since I got it!
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You’re right about that, way too few inputs for my needs.
I agree, that can be annoying. I understand that some people want to have the clean tracks to daw so they can add effects afterwards but I like to use effects on the fly while jamming and do as little as possible on daw.
How exactly do you do this routing?
Thanks for the great overview on the MTK. I have one effect pedal and I’m thinking about getting some Strymon etc effects so the missing return can turn out to be a problem.
You route the channels out of the aux send I think, and back in on a spare pair of input channels. It’s a similar deal on my EFX12 but in order to do this you are using (and hence losing) the monitor sends. So you can’t have monitors and an effects bus at the same time.
The inbuilt effects are very decent, and I wish I had the dbx compressors of the MTK series. But that is the one obvious missing feature.
There are individual channel insert sockets but obviously you can’t bus multiple channels etc.
Edit: oh, the MTK has no channel inserts at all? Ok, that is a bit tricky.
You can route the returns through groups or an aux and then patch their outputs to a stereo input.[quote=“Sai, post:32, topic:33223”]
Thanks for the great overview on the MTK. I have one effect pedal and I’m thinking about getting some Strymon etc effects so the missing return can turn out to be a problem.
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Yeah, a lot of outboard almost demands the larger 22 MTK, in my opinion. I have yet to feel the lack of returns as a serious limitation and I have racks full of outboard. I tend to always use proper channels for returns no matter what mixer I am using, simply so I can have more sonic control over them. Also, as finalform said, the built-in effects are actually pretty good - if limited, and I have turned to them many times rather than patching in a better outboard unit.
Exactly. That’s my biggest complaint. For someone with little or no outboard, it’s likely to be a non-issue (and you can use plugins as inserts), but I get around it by sending a channel to a group and bringing it back in on another channel Oh, that’s another thing: the USB conversion is tapped right after the gain, so if you want to track with the board’s EQ, you have to do the same thing. However, I only use those EQs when mixing, for the most part.
of course you can - just route the fx to grp 1/2
Anyway, Getting a 12MTK in the next 48 hours so I’ll be able to tell you more about the sound quality. Tried a kmix, (loved to form factor and the USB battery operation ability) but didn’t like the sound I got from it. YMMV as usual though.
A bit curious decision on the MTK, that AD placement in the signalpath. They coulda at least allow for the locut and the limiters to do their job before conversion? Also, the idea that trim should be set to as near the clipping point as possible in order to get decent SNR thru the AD conversion reeks of weak 90s digital audio lol. What is even the point of recording @ 24 bit if you cannot afford to have any headroom? It sounds like a return to the 16 bit depth ages and OCDing about peak meter reading again, dreading for intersample peaks etc
AFAIR the 12/22MTK was supposed to cost more than what they originally announced? This is why there was a major delay in shipping these, and most likely why the knobs etc feel cheap - bet they had to cut corners on everything else but the guts of the unit in order to cut their losses.
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OK, I meant as channel inserts but fair enough.
I think I may have been confusing here… the pres are quiet, so you can take advantage of the dynamics on offer - I just suggested the careful gain-leveling as a way to ensure that levels were good and loud to minimize the effect of the level reduction when that signal is piped back down USB to the mixer. I haven’t had any trouble with excess noise - no more than from any other modern analogue device. Certainly not 90s-era, thank goodness. What makes it feel a bit screwy is that the gain knobs have a weird curve. That isn’t to say that the gain is weak - but you might have to crank the knob more than you’d expect to get the levels you want. Rest assured, though, there is plenty of gain for anything you throw at it. I used a ribbon mic to track a mountain dulcimer - a very delicate, quiet instrument - and was able to capture the sound very nicely with the MTK’s pre-amp.
Hi, do you use the Qu Pac for recording AND mixing or do you mix the recorded tracks ITB?
Is it easy to import the tracks in a DAW?
I’m using Protools, do I have to import manually track by track?
When this is not the right topic to ask, please direct me to the correct one.
Cheers
Elektron users seem to love the QU-PAC but there are other digital mixers to consider.
Behringer XR18 (they also have a 12 and 16 channel versions) works both as a mixer and an 18 in/out IO card that works with Mac, Windows and iOS (record direct to ipad).
You can find it for about half the price of the QU-PAC, but its main drawback/advantage is that it doesn’t have any controls on the unit, you have to use a device: andriod, ios, or laptop to control it. XR-18 inputs all can be either mic or line, which is nice.
Obviously in your home studio this isn’t an issue but for some needing a smartphone or tablet when playing live could be a deal-killer. (it was for me, I went with a QSC touchmix 16 for my band’s live setup, which I love).
QSC also just released a 30 channel touchmix that can be used via USB direct with a DAW. Going to have a larger footprint but its a lot of channels.
Anyway, good luck with your search.
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tl;dr … maybe this is an option too
should be cheaper than shown here and there’s a 12 input version as well for half the money
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Nice one, I had missed this one totally. The 12 input one might do for me since I don’t have so much space left on my table! Great. I’ll take a closer look at the specs.
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Thanks for elaborating on this. Reading the design engineers notes of the MTK on gearslutz had me worried about the levels there. I have no problems whatsoever using 24bit digital systems at around -24dB to -18dB peak range, so got a lil worried about this. I only turn stuff up at the last stage (premastering)
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uhh say whatt! looks like my plans to get the 12MTK just got canceled until further notice ;}
Behringer buying Midas might have been the best move they’ve made yet… Dayum. This is looking like the 12MTK on steroids.
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Hmm, thanks for the insight. At the moment I’m trying to decide between the K-mix and LR-16. Both very different products, and if I got the LR-16 I’d have to get a 16 channel mixer with inserts, plus buy/make the cables for it… so hmm I really don’t know.
And yeah, for reverb I have a Quadraverb, Midiverb III and Behringer Virtualizer Pro, but I mostly wondered if I could get away with not having to lug those to a live show…
My other thought for purely getting audio into my DAW was to connect four of those tiny Behringer RCA interfaces to a hub and use them as an aggregate device… but that just seems like it’d be a recipe for disaster.
LR-16 needs cable that one side is TRS and the other side isd TS.
Such type of cable is not popular.
So,i use this adaptor.
It works.