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Author Topic: Which one would you choose in working with a DAW  (Read 2699 times)

Glenn Bucci

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Which one would you choose in working with a DAW
« on: May 07, 2005, 07:15:49 AM »

With a digital mixer, you can control your DAW with it's midi fader layer like the Yamaha mixers have. Plus you get some clean pre's and 4 effects per channel or 2 at 96.  

With a Controller you have total control of your DAW and scrible strips that let you know what is on each fader. Then you can buy a small analog mixer for routing.

With the quality of plug ins, do we really need a digital mixer whose effects are the same quality as a UAD or Powercore? What benifit do you see with one over the other and why would you go that way?

I have a digital mixer and will be upgrading it. I will either go with the new Tascam DM 3200 with meter bridge http://www.tascam.com/Products/dm3200.html , or get a Mackie controller, expander, Mackie Onyx mixer and a Lynx card for additional converters to work with my Mytek A/D converter. Yes it's a home studio.
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Barry Hufker

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Re: Which one would you choose in working with a DAW
« Reply #1 on: May 07, 2005, 04:05:09 PM »

I don't pretend to know the "ins" and "outs" of all this, but one thought certainly comes to mind.  Often times dealers will say, but an analog console (often vintage).  Set the faders to 0 and then let your DAW act as the automation, bringing levels up and down, etc.

Someone may offer a better insight but I find this to be sloppy engineering practice.  If the fader is up at 0 and no signal is being sent from the DAW surely just general hiss and any other garbage are still conveyed through the mixer and so to the mix.

Maybe in this context a digital mixer is preferable.

Barry
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dpd

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Re: Which one would you choose in working with a DAW
« Reply #2 on: May 07, 2005, 04:15:38 PM »

If a console fader at 0 has audible noise when fed from a line-level device (no mic preamp in the chain), it's time to replace that mixer.  As bad as the DDA FMR at our radio station live studio is, it doesn't have any noise when used in that situation.
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Touchwood Studios

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Re: Which one would you choose in working with a DAW
« Reply #3 on: May 07, 2005, 08:01:41 PM »

None of the above.
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Glenn Bucci

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Re: Which one would you choose in working with a DAW
« Reply #4 on: May 09, 2005, 06:51:30 AM »

Touchwood Studios wrote on Sat, 07 May 2005 20:01

None of the above.


Well what other alternative do I have staying in the $4,000 range? The new Tascam DM 3200, or Mackie controller, Mackie Expander, a Allen & Heath or Mackie Onyx mixer with Lynx 2 card.
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Ronny

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Re: Which one would you choose in working with a DAW
« Reply #5 on: May 09, 2005, 11:47:04 AM »

Barry Hufker wrote on Sat, 07 May 2005 16:05

I don't pretend to know the "ins" and "outs" of all this, but one thought certainly comes to mind.  Often times dealers will say, but an analog console (often vintage).  Set the faders to 0 and then let your DAW act as the automation, bringing levels up and down, etc.

Someone may offer a better insight but I find this to be sloppy engineering practice.  If the fader is up at 0 and no signal is being sent from the DAW surely just general hiss and any other garbage are still conveyed through the mixer and so to the mix.

Maybe in this context a digital mixer is preferable.

Barry



The zero's on the input gain knobs, the channel faders, the master buss faders and the stereo master fader on analog consoles are there for a reason. When everything is set to zero the console is operating at maximum efficiency, passing signal at unity gain through the component design. While it's nigh impossible to get a yardstick tracking and a yardstick mix with all knobs on zero, the closer that all are to zero, the less distortion you will exhibit.

On the question of whether to go with a digi console for DAW, I would rather go digi into a DAW than annie, but I'd rather not go into a PC/Mac DAW at all and track to stand alone linear HD-R's. Reliability is damn near 100%, no crashes, no latency issues, no defragging and no non-audio programs running in the background such as Windows or Apple components. There is a world of difference in digital devices that are designed and dedicated to audio only, than ones that run on PC/Mac apps that share resources with non-audio events. I have a 96 input annie console and two digi consoles and about the only thing that I use the big console for anymore these days is running headphone mixes. As far as going analog summing for color, I find that I can get all the color that I want, more of a palette and better control of it remaining in the digital realm on just about any application these days.
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t(h)ik

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Re: Which one would you choose in working with a DAW
« Reply #6 on: May 09, 2005, 04:10:18 PM »

Ronny,

You have an awesome post but I think you went over my man's budget, BTW say hi to annie for me  Smile

The only reason I would never pay that much for a digital mixer is because of the all your eggs in one basket/obsolescense factor.

With a DAW and decent converters and a mixer you can upgrade the converters without such a hit, or if you come into some cash without revamping the whole damn system.

Lemme Nough

TIK
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t(h)ik

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Re: Which one would you choose in working with a DAW
« Reply #7 on: May 09, 2005, 04:15:47 PM »

Sorry,

Plus if you have more than one converter (eight channel or so) it is easier to isolate problems.

Plus if something breaks you can still work...

Unless of course you have two digital mixers side by side  Smile
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Ronny

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Re: Which one would you choose in working with a DAW
« Reply #8 on: May 09, 2005, 08:41:11 PM »

sixtiksix wrote on Mon, 09 May 2005 16:15

Sorry,

Plus if you have more than one converter (eight channel or so) it is easier to isolate problems.

Plus if something breaks you can still work...

Unless of course you have two digital mixers side by side  Smile



I've been running FOH and stage monitors through digi consoles for 7 years now. I use to carry a spare annie board for the first couple of years, but I've never had any downtime due to a digi console going out and never had to swap out for another or the annie spare. Now I just bring digi consoles.

Sixtiksix, they also eliminate a wall of annie rack processors such as gates, comps, limiters, graphics, parametrics, verbs, delay's and modulation fx along with comprehensive internal digital patchbay where analog signal path is not extended going through switchs and annie connections and susceptible to EMI. When you consider the money that you can save by eliminating many annie racks, the price of a digi console may look better than you may realize. It's no doubt the future, over 100 rock tours a year are using the PM1D. On the monitor side, Neil Diamond was using 9 01v's to send totally separate IEM mixes to each of his 17 band members. I heard they liked it so much that he's upgrading to 01v96's.
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