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Folks that have never worked with pro level analog gear or only digital gear really have no comparative experience, just like folks that play $500 guitars can't understand why somebody would buy a $5000 guitar. There really are significant differences that are readily obvious to experienced providers.

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I can appreciate the love for analog gear and I think everyone should use what they are most comfortable with, BUT, going digital does not involve a compromise of pro quality. Most of the top pros have gone digital because it helps them do a better job as well as make life easier.

 

And you know, sometimes a guitar is worth $5000.00 because of collectability, rarity, or just sentimental value and a $500.00 guitar can actually sound and play better!

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Certainly, many pros have gone digital because ofthe convenience of onboard dynamics, effects, routing, eq and output buses. Size and weight also play into the decision as many guys are now carrying for tours, even bus and trailer tours. In fact, my need for a digital console for touring acts has almost completely gone away and I am doing a lot more racks & stacks gigs than ever before. Makes it even harder to justify spending real money on an SC48 or M7 or (fill in the blank).

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Hadn't thought of that Andy. When it no longer requires an H3000 and several racks of gear, it suddenly becomes possible to put it on the tour bus with you.

 

My world of music doesn't get anywhere near this level. For me (as you point out), number one and two were size and weight with a distant third being features.

 

I was pleasantly surprised to get an improvement in sound quality as well.

 

I setup for my performance in the church tonight. Took the multi-track recording, fed it back through my X32 Rack which was feeding 2 channels in the churches LS9-32 ...... went out front with my iPad, did some equalizing, a bit of mixing, and woot, out comes a very nice mix for tomorrow (assuming that I don't botch the piano .... I normally play guitar). Very cool feature.

 

I can also see the other side of the coin.

 

I have never used an LS9 before. Fortunately, all I needed to do was turn the channels on and adjust my X32 Rack output so that the input was at around -14db. The screen seemed pretty small (or my eyes are just getting so bad that everything looks small), but I would have required some time to figure out anything advanced on the beast. I found the channel on/off button, channel VU meter and sliders for the channel I was using pretty easy ;) Everything else .... not so straight forward.

 

I have heard that the MIDAS unusual design as well (albeit not as unusual as the LS9 I would think).

 

On pretty much any analog board, I can immediately find:

 

1) Gain,

2) Slider,

3) Sends

4) PEQ

5) HPF

 

Everything else generally requires some cable tracing to find where compressors/gates/efx are routed. Groups seem to be done differently on different boards as well.

 

I can see how one could get used to running such a board efficiently though. The setup and routing of a digital seems to be better .... at least for me.

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