So there’s a Mackie CR1604 mixer available on my local CL, and I’m interested in it. I’ve heard all the myth and hype around this era of mixer as an unsung hero of electronic music, with a desirable overdriven sound and a lot of features for the price. The issue is, I already have a more contemporary Mackie, a 1402 VLZ3, which I’m not crazy about. Not enough sends, I don’t need mic pre amps, gain overdrive sounds terrible. Would going back in time to this classic Mackie mixer of the 90s really be a significant step up, or is it just not worth it nowadays?
i have one i’ve been using for 15ish years. it’s a fine mixer, i’m not sure i can pinpoint anything magical about it really to be honest though… it does have “a sound” when overdriven but i tend to send everything into the box clean mostly. the amount of sends is great, the EQ is whatever the opposite of “surgical” is, but i’m not using it for mixing really so it’s kind of nice have a big dumb crude analog EQ at the front end of my kit before everything goes digital for recording. every few years i consider jumping over to a 1604 VLZ from a similiar vintage because i could use the submixes and more routing options, but i never do
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This guy talks about how he uses the Mackie for drive/distortion - not sure exactly which model it is - you might recognise in the video. Audio is from the room but you’ll get an idea…
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