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the "virtual soundcheck" thing ...


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seems more like a marketing dept benefit than real world benefit. My buddy touts that ability on his StudioLive w/laptop. I can't really see where that's all that useful since it doesn't take into account any instruments being played onstage. How could you expect to create a mix from previously recorded tracks only without factoring in real drums, amps, horns, key rigs, etc?

 

Am i just having a bad attitude or am I missing an important opportunity? I have the SL and have never used that "feature"

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I use it all the time on my X32. There are two counter points I would make.

 

First, you are correct. If you have any significant stage volume, then you really can't expect to get a representative mix like this in a smaller venue .... although in a larger venue or outside, it is much closer. My band uses vDrums and the guitar amps are low and facing the rear of the stage to prevent beaming, so it actually works pretty good for us.

 

Second, even without this, it is really nice to be able to set channels up at your leisure vs in the heat of battle. You can see how the vocal compression, verb and delay are all working for you as well as getting a good eq on each channel one at a time.

 

Again, if lots of your over-all volume is coming from the stage vs FOH, this really doesn't have nearly the same validity.

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I agree with OneEng. I personally find it very helpful to get things roughed in -- even when stage volume is missing from the mix. Now it works extremely well indeed for my friend/mentor who's the BE for a national touring NewGrass act. Stage volume is precisely that of five acoustic instruments and five vocals and they are almost always playing to a large(ish) house with a supplied FOH so he "tunes" what he can before the boys come out for live sound check -- which is always done anyway.

 

However, to be honest I mostly record for my benefit so I can rerun the show at home and explore/tweak things I didn't get the way I wanted while live. Of course, remember I'm a newbie and still learning every show...

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I can see some benefits on repeating gigs, with the same inputs, mics, monitors, etc, where stage volumes are low like that. I could see where an ipad app and tracks could allow you to do monitor mixes before the act gets there. But in a club playing back tracks from another different gig... hmmm,.

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I think perhaps the term "soundcheck" is a bit too much of a misnomer and optimistic. But it's the closest recognizable phrase so using it is understandable. "Virtual Rough Mix" and "First Crack at it" probably didn't make it very far through the marketing department...

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I can do it, I generally don't. I might record some of sound level and then say "hey guys, check this out. I play it back for them. A lot of times they want me to record the gig, which I do and I sell them the tracks for $50 on an 8gb USB drive. Turn down your aux's when you play it back for them.

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I actually use "virtual soundcheck" for training purposes with my crew in the shop. It's a great tool to let people wanting to learn how a mixer works and play with fx without the pressure of messing up a gig. If I have tracks of a band I have worked with before, I will use it to test out my system config in the shop beforehand. I don't do muh with eq or gain just basic routing and channel pachtching.

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