# Upgrading from Midas M32



## LPdan (Aug 15, 2019)

Hello,
We currently use a Midas M32 in our local theatre, but have been running out of channels. It looks like we will get approval to purchase a new console with higher channel count, so I am curious about opinions on which to buy. We have been completely happy with the M32. Should we be looking at larger Midas consoles? Other considerations? I'm thinking 60 mix inputs minimum.
Thanks!


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## spenserh (Aug 15, 2019)

Allen & Heath D-Live, or Digico.

Are you doing lots of Musical Theatre? Is so an SD9T might be the ticket.


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## macsound (Aug 15, 2019)

Besides channel count, what are you looking for in this upgrade? More faders, smaller footprint, Dante. 
Coming from an M32 but now looking for input capacity of over 60, you're moving from a VW to an Audi. So not quite the Bentley but adding a 0. 
Is there a budget? Mixing with 2 consoles is cheaper than buying one big one.


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## LPdan (Aug 15, 2019)

Yes, most of our performances are musical theater. We expect to need a larger footprint, so size is not a concern. The primary objective is to get more inputs. While more faders would be nice, we could live with more layers, but would not want less faders.
While it's not a case of price is no object, the administration is very much about paying for the right solution. I know we could link a second M32, but seems kind of sloppy. My guess is we could be somewhere in the 10k-20k range.


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## TimMc (Aug 15, 2019)

There are odd limitations to the Midas Pro series (no pre-everything sends on some, but not all models, for example). Midas/Music Group has been teasing with a "new" console and leaked pictures for a couple of years but still seems to be VaporWare (thank you, Jerry Pournell). The Pro Series has effectively reached EOL status, too, with only the X model in production although upgrade packages are available for the Pro 6/9.

You may want to look at the Yamaha CL5 (everybody's 2nd choice) but you won't get 64 inputs and a surface for US$20k. You're looking at around $40k for a CL5 surface and 2 rio 3224, more $$ if you need the Waves Mini YGDAI card or the Dugan Automixer card.

I think your board will find some serious sticker shock as the M32 represented a -6dB$ reduction in price/feature set. Moving up the food chain will be very expensive in comparison regardless of brand.

Other than input quantity what about the M32 would you like to improve upon? Routing? Channel strip processing? Integration with Waves Soundgrid/Server? Recording options? More automation flexibility? More groups/mixes/DCAs? A different/better user interface?


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## steine (Aug 16, 2019)

60+ channels

CL3 or CL5 if we look at Yamaha, but will get above budget.
DigiCo SD9T might be usable.
Some might suggest A&H DLive series.

For the channelcount I have the CL5 as 1.st, but then it could be down to mixed feelings with the Digimute.... ehhh DigiCo I have met.


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## LPdan (Aug 16, 2019)

So any good/bad with Yamaha? I’ve heard the opinion that they can be harsh sounding. What about Digico? I’ve never touched one due to price, always heard they were the Cadillac. Appreciate all the input!


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## Footer (Aug 16, 2019)

LPdan said:


> So any good/bad with Yamaha? I’ve heard the opinion that they can be harsh sounding. What about Digico? I’ve never touched one due to price, always heard they were the Cadillac. Appreciate all the input!



The newer yamaha stuff sounds just fine. I have two Pro2's in my space... I personally like how the Pro2 sounds compared to the Yamaha stuff, but we do a lot of music so that midas warmness is welcome. 

60 channels is going to cost you at least 30k-40k. Even in the Pro series you'd be talking about at least a Pro3. With Yamaha you'll be looking at 2 full Reo boxes. If you can live with 56 your world opens up a bit. There a pro2 would do it. I'd avoid any of the Avid or Soundcraft stuff. 

But... you mentioned musical theatre. How long of runs? Do actors swap out regularly? Are you doing line by line mixing? If any of those are true, ignore everything I said above you buy a T series Digico desk. Digico has the best programming out of any console line out there. They are they only desk that Broadway uses.


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## markviml (Aug 16, 2019)

You can do 60+ on Yamaha with a QL5 (32 inputs on board) and a Rio3224. Actually more channels if you want to route some things into stereo channels, perhaps FX over Dante. 

I personally like the layout of the QL vs the CL. I mix solely on custom layers, have a shortcut to get to that setup screen. I really like having the faders close together: easy to get my pinkie on a 9th DCA for a busy scene/band/verb. We use it in a busy PAC: bands, music theatre (line by line), a church meets here with volunteer operators, so on so on...

Mike


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## LPdan (Aug 16, 2019)

I'm definitely open to 56 channels. TimMc mentioned above that the Midas Pro series had effectively reached end of life? While we have been happy with the M32, I did always feel like the scene recall was less than ideal.
What opens up if you stay with 56 channels? What's the price point of the Digico SD9T, I can't seem to find them online. Sounding kind of like decision is between Yamaha and Digico?


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## MNicolai (Aug 16, 2019)

Re: Yamaha, most projects I do with Yamaha QL/CL end up going QL with Tio's.

The Tio's and QL's are so much cheaper than the CL's and Rio's for not a seriously tangible difference. The major difference stepping up to the CL series is more knobs for the physical mix surface. Could be important to you if you are doing intensive mixing day-in/day-out.

Moving up to Rio's...is expensive. You can get 96kHz, but the QL/CL desks don't support 96k. You can get AES/EBU, if that's important to you. My understanding is that the mic pre's are in fact different between the Tio's and Rio's, but I've yet to hear anyone make a remark about being able to discern that difference.

I would say the vast majority of projects I see for theaters are either Yamaha ($$) or Digico ($$$$$). If you go Digico, make sure you're looking at a -T version intended for theater or you'll become suicidal. That said -- Yamaha is more universally accessible. It's much easier to find people who can mix on Yamaha than on Digico unless you're hiring top tier A1's.

In general, I would say you will be best served by something that has Dante. Yamaha can do that natively, Digico needs a bridge. When I do Qlab into Yamaha's, I like to bring my multichannel mix in over Dante Virtual Soundcard. No external interface required.

Both Yamaha and Digico have been good stewards to their customers in maintaining their consoles over time. Over the last 7-8 years, Yamaha has released 5 major updates to the QL/CL series, each of which has had noteworthy feature releases like adding the Dugan automixers, RTA's, control of Shure ULX-D's and Axient directly from the mix surface, etc. Similarly, Digico has done things like increase the number of channels a desk can support that you could activate by paying a small fee to upgrade your mix engine. If you bought desks from them 6 years ago, rest assured you'll be able to mix them into the ground. They're not likely to become functionally obsolete anytime soon unless your needs fundamentally change.


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## MNicolai (Aug 16, 2019)

LPdan said:


> I'm definitely open to 56 channels. TimMc mentioned above that the Midas Pro series had effectively reached end of life? While we have been happy with the M32, I did always feel like the scene recall was less than ideal.
> What opens up if you stay with 56 channels? What's the price point of the Digico SD9T, I can't seem to find them online. Sounding kind of like decision is between Yamaha and Digico?



SD9T, retail is $40k-70k including a couple D racks depending on what you fit it out with (MADI, ST fiber, HMA fiber -- HMA being the most expensive, MADI only being the cheapest)


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## LPdan (Aug 16, 2019)

MNicolai, thanks for all that input. I took a look at the Yamaha QL5, looks like it could be a good fit. The local inputs would be nice as we have our wireless racks in the sound booth. Appreciate the note on support, that is very important to us.
Any idea how scene recall is on the QL5?


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## LPdan (Aug 16, 2019)

The DigiCo seems like it is out of range on price. I just got a nice quote for the QL5.......


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## markviml (Aug 16, 2019)

LPdan said:


> Any idea how scene recall is on the QL5?



It's pretty good. 90% of what I would ideally want for theatre. A combination of recall safe and focus recall on scenes is very powerful. You can chang mutes and DCAs, but not band EQ, but ocasionally a channel EQ... All up to how much detail you want to program in.


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## MNicolai (Aug 16, 2019)

Re: Scene Recall, it's come a _long_ way from the LS9 days when it sucked if you were doing more than a handful of scenes.

When they developed the CL series 7-8 years ago, Yamaha looked at how lighting consoles handled theatrical cue stacks and used that as a basis for how they handle scenes. That's where they got the idea for their Blind function that allows you to make changes in other cues without messing up your live mix.

Think there's some good YouTube videos demonstrating it if you want to see it in action. Just be cognizant that if you look at videos from 2013/2014, they've added features and made improvements since then.


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## BCAP (Aug 17, 2019)

CL/QL is a good board. Probably a very tiny issue and would be far from a deal breaker for me personally but I've had some issues with the CL/QL recording function using the USB jack on the front of the console. You's supposed to be able to put a flash drive in it, and record a performance. I've found it helpful at times. No *.wav format support and the units I've recorded performances on a few times the file became corrupted during recording.


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## Footer (Aug 18, 2019)

LPdan said:


> I'm definitely open to 56 channels. TimMc mentioned above that the Midas Pro series had effectively reached end of life? While we have been happy with the M32, I did always feel like the scene recall was less than ideal.



They have end of lifed any new consoles in that line. They are still supporting them though. FWIW, most consoles I see come through are either Midas or Digico. We see hardly any Yamaha. Avid has pretty much gone away except for the tours that can't afford Digico or shows where the band doesn't want to pay to re-tech their entire show. There are still a ton of Midas desks out there. I'd still pull a quote for a Pro2 just to see.


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## TimMc (Aug 18, 2019)

Footer said:


> They have end of lifed any new consoles in that line. They are still supporting them though. FWIW, most consoles I see come through are either Midas or Digico. We see hardly any Yamaha. Avid has pretty much gone away except for the tours that can't afford Digico or shows where the band doesn't want to pay to re-tech their entire show. There are still a ton of Midas desks out there. I'd still pull a quote for a Pro2 just to see.


There are still Pro series desks in inventory, both at Music Group and their distributors/retailers, but I'm told they ain't building any more of them. How long Midas supports any product *might* be illustrated by how TurboSound (owned by Music Group) supports the Turbo professional lines that were only a couple years old when Music Group bought Turbo... which is to say, fuhgettaboutit.

The desks I'm seeing on music events are DigiCo SD9, SD12 mostly. A couple of Midas ProX, some Pro2 (almost no Pro6 or Pro 9), then Avid S6L with various sized surfaces and Yammy CL/QL/Rio. Lots of Avid Profiles still working out there, too.

Touring musical theater? The newer shows are on some flavor of DigiCo, haven't seen a Midas. One show came through with a Yammy PM-10 Rivage but I wasn't there to see/hear it.

If the venue does more than musical theater the Yamaha CL/QL ecosystem is a good bet in terms of acceptance.


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## LPdan (Aug 19, 2019)

Thanks everyone for all this valuable input. Our venue does more than musical theater, but that is the majority. We aren't trying to meet riders, just want a good board for in-house use, and if outside groups want to use it. I still have a lot of research to do, but I think Digico is probably out of price range, and probably going to have a tough sell buying something discontinued. Is Midas replacing these models with something new or getting out of that product range?


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## TimMc (Aug 19, 2019)

LPdan said:


> Thanks everyone for all this valuable input. Our venue does more than musical theater, but that is the majority. We aren't trying to meet riders, just want a good board for in-house use, and if outside groups want to use it. I still have a lot of research to do, but I think Digico is probably out of price range, and probably going to have a tough sell buying something discontinued. Is Midas replacing these models with something new or getting out of that product range?



There have been "leaked" pictures of the new Midas Pro### prototypes. Looks like the lovechild of M32 and Pro X but there has been no actual info released by Music Group. Perhaps introduced at this fall's Audio Engineering Society convention/show or in Jan at Winter NAMM... or maybe it's all smoke and mirrors, who knows?

I had a physically proximate chat with a Midas support rep who didn't answer my question of "what happened to Kyle Chirnside?" But he alluded to the new Midas being released "real soon now" (which was said a year ago, too) and a major announcement for TurboSound.

The price issue for your needs is channel count. Simply put, there's no cheap way to do this. The inexpensive-but-capable mixers currently max out at 32 inputs. Depending on how you handle orchestra/playback/utility audio it might be simpler to have those on a sub-mixer and feed L/R and a couple of foldback lines into the main mixer. Using the M32, you could bring 6 submixer lines back in via the main mixer's "AUX" inputs and keep all 32 XLR/AES main mixer inputs for your actor mics.

Edit ps: A friend of mine was audio director for the Tulsa Performing Arts Center and they ended up with a seriously DANTE networked Yamaha CL/QL system that he and house staff installed and provisioned. The PAC has multiple performance and meeting spaces (2 actual theaters) and they're able to send/receive audio between all of them. This was an upgrade from PM5D mixers in the theaters and Mackie analog in the other rooms; the facility users are pleased with the capabilities.


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## FMEng (Aug 19, 2019)

The Presonus StudioLive 64S breaks the $5,000 price barrier without a stage box. I've never used a Presonus console, so I have no idea how it would fare doing theater.


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## MNicolai (Aug 19, 2019)

@FMEng, that's a fairly new model but in my past encounters the Presonus stuff is pretty user-hostile. Crude, but for the price you pay, you can't expect a whole lot. Which is also to say if your needs/expectations aren't too high, you could end up feeling you got a really good deal. Maybe worth doing a demo of if you can, but Presonus hasn't earned a reputation that I think anyone looking for more than 16 inputs should blindly purchase their products without evaluating them first for their particular application.

From my perspective, their product development model appears to be largely based on delivering lots of filled check boxes on a spec sheet and not so much about delivering a reliable, user-friendly device that you can throw musical theater at. I wouldn't be shocked if the 64S was a direct reaction to me rejecting Presonus on a project 2 years ago in place of a QL5 for, among other reasons, having only 32 channels on the proposed mix surface and lacking Dante _(note: the 64S has AVB, not Dante -- that means no Dante virtual soundcard, no integration with wireless mic receivers like ULXDQ's, compatible with fewer DSP's than Dante, and quite frankly leaves you with none of the good ones unless you drop a small fortune...) _What followed was the least professional correspondence I've encountered from any manufacturer ever, from leadership at Presonus, circumventing the bid solicitation process and directly badmouthing my design to the client.

Also important -- the average cost of wireless mic's is $1k/channel. If you're mixing 32+ channels of wireless of 20+ channels of wired, I get really nervous putting $40,000-$60,000 worth of inputs into a $5k mixer. That quality of mixer undermines the value of your other investments and can be a bottleneck to how your entire system sounds all day, every day. Maybe not noticeable when everything is flat but start delving into effects, EQ's, and compressors and your mix could get pretty jagged around the edges. Similar things have been said historically about the X32, but Behringer at least has the shear brute force of market share at the sub $5k price point that they can afford the proper R&D to make a functioning console for that cost tier.

I'm not saying write Presonus off entirely, but try before you buy and apply scrutiny to how it sounds and how easy it is to use. Musical theater is one of the hardest forms of live mixing. In that application you really don't want navigating and using your mix console to be an obstacle in and of itself that you have to leap over constantly.


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## macsound (Aug 20, 2019)

I've been impressed with the Allen and Heath SQ series, tons of features and the price is right. That's why I was wondering about your feeling of having 2 consoles. SQ's max channel count is 48 I believe, but they link seamlessly with the SLink card. 
Ultimately, you'd probably only end up mixing from one but being able to glance over and see what the band or other wireless looks like is great. I think that's why most theatre (that I've worked in) has always been large consoles, just so you can see the faders at a glance. No one has time for page flips during line mixing. And sometimes you just need to grab that brake drum mic for the one orchestral section that uses it but didn't remember to build a cue. 
So getting 2 SQ7s for the price of a QL gets you 32 more faders would be my vote. And the added flexibility if you need to use it for something else, you can unlink them and use them separately.


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## Jeff Lelko (Aug 20, 2019)

I’ll toss in a dLive vote. I like mine, though I’ve never had the chance to try it in a live theater setting yet. The option cards and additional I/O boxes will easily handle your immediate and potential growth situation. Something like a C3500 paired with a CDM32 will still set you back about $20K, but I feel that it’s one of the most cost-effective “big” desks currently on the market. I have no idea what kind of theatrical rider-friendliness a dLive has, but it’s definitely gaining some traction in the other corners of the industry. I chose the dLive for personal ownership simply due to its tremendous flexibility. Hope this helps!


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## yert33 (Aug 21, 2019)

I can't quite dismiss the thought of getting another M32 (or an M32R) and possibly a DL32 stagebox to solve your channel count issue. Using the M32R as a sidecar mixer. You're already in the M32 ecosystem and, as you say, it's mainly for in-house staff to use. I've seen an M32R + DL32 bundle offerd for $4K total. 

As far as scene control goes, I roll my own snippets and use QLAb via MIDI to recall M32 snippets. I'm only changing DCA assignments, DCA scribble strips labels and DCA scribble strip colors, though. I know that Palladium can control 2 M32s at once. 

Seems like an inexpensive solution to me.


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## Footer (Aug 22, 2019)

LPdan said:


> Is Midas replacing these models with something new or getting out of that product range?



The talk for the last few years was going to be a large format desk built off the back of the X32/M32 software. There is a lot that has to go into making that happen, but thats the goal. The current pro line is built off of the XL8 and that thing is very long in the tooth. The software is good, the hardware is good, and I still don't think any desk sounds better. When we bought both our Pro2's the Avid offering was the Profile and the Yamaha was the M7... so it was an easy choice. The Yamaha stuff is good though... but I've been listening to a Midas desk for so long its hard for me to listen to anything else.


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## dcaughran (Aug 23, 2019)

My theatre was in this exact situation last year. Unfortunately there are very few options for reasonably priced consoles with 64+ inputs. We ultimately decided on the Yamaha QL5 with two TIO1608 stage boxes. The whole kit cost us less than $14k and we couldn't be happier with it. Our theatre focuses on musicals and the board has kept us. We're using the onboard I/O for the wireless mic rack at FOH and the Dante stage boxes for the band inputs on the stage. We're also feeding the PA via Dante. For us what really sealed the deal was the Yamaha QL editor, it's the cleanest interface of any we tested. Most of our volunteers already had experience on other Yamaha consoles and were able to come up to speed on the QL quickly. 

For what it's worth we did also look at the dLive system, the only other reasonable console in that price range. In our testing the console's software was just sluggish and not intuitive. The offline editor was similarly sluggish and not laid out well for the type of programming we needed to do.


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## TimMc (Aug 25, 2019)

LPdan said:


> Hello,
> We currently use a Midas M32 in our local theatre, but have been running out of channels. It looks like we will get approval to purchase a new console with higher channel count, so I am curious about opinions on which to buy. We have been completely happy with the M32. Should we be looking at larger Midas consoles? Other considerations? I'm thinking 60 mix inputs minimum.
> Thanks!


More news - the Midas Heritage D debuts next week. Reported as 144 Flex input channels, 120 Flex outputs, 24 VGA, 24 POP groups/layers, up to 600 channels of connected i/o to assign to that 144x120. Pricing to follow, I'm told.


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## steine (Aug 25, 2019)

The specs of the Heritage D sounds a bit like those on Rolands now discontinued M5000 series.
But it may well be too pricey compared to eg. a ql5 with TiO's or similar.


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## TimMc (Aug 25, 2019)

steine said:


> The specs of the Heritage D sounds a bit like those on Rolands now discontinued M5000 series.
> But it may well be too pricey compared to eg. a ql5 with TiO's or similar.



Price is indeed the speculative point and the pundits are thinking the D should come in around or under dLive prices. My guess is <US$20k for the minimal package and topping out <US$40k for the Full Meal Deal.

Heritage D apparently has at least 2 different mix engines and modular i/o... not sure if the legacy DLxxx stage boxes will work with the D.


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## TimMc (Aug 28, 2019)

Okay, the word is out: 
MAP is US$35,000 for the mixer, no external engines. Existing DLxxx stage boxes will work with it.


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## LPdan (Aug 30, 2019)

Looking like I will recommend the QL5. Thanks for all the great info and discussion!


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## TimmyP1955 (Dec 9, 2019)

I'd hold out if possible until the Heritage Digital is available. However on the cheap side, depending on how many of your sources are stereo, the Behringer Wing (or the Midas version - surely there will be one?) has 48 stereo channels. I'm lead to believe that the street price will be a lot better than we have been told.


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## Jay Ashworth (Dec 10, 2019)

TimMc said:


> I think your board will find some serious sticker shock as the M32 represented a -6dB$ reduction[...]



I'm so stealing that.


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## TimMc (Dec 10, 2019)

Jay Ashworth said:


> I'm so stealing that.


Credit for the dB$ goes to Jay Barracato, from a reply he made to a blog post of mine at Soundforums dot net.


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## TimmyP1955 (Dec 16, 2019)

TimmyP1955 said:


> I'd hold out if possible until the Heritage Digital is available. However on the cheap side, depending on how many of your sources are stereo, the Behringer Wing (or the Midas version - surely there will be one?) has 48 stereo channels. I'm lead to believe that the street price will be a lot better than we have been told.



I meant that the street on the Heritage will be less than we have been told. Duh.


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## Scott Lumley (Dec 17, 2019)

FMEng said:


> The Presonus StudioLive 64S breaks the $5,000 price barrier without a stage box. I've never used a Presonus console, so I have no idea how it would fare doing theater.


I'm a little late, but I thought I would share my opinion on a PreSonus console. We have a StudioLive 32 Series III (I know it is too small for what is needed in this thread, but my problems are probably not specific to this model), and I wouldn't recommend it.

Every time there is a firmware update to fix an issue, it seems like something else gets broken.

Sometimes, when booting up, it doesn't load correctly or has missing screens for some of the faders. To solve, I just have to turn it off and back on again.

I've also experienced issues where it boots up and appears fine, but then audio doesn't pass through the outputs even though the meters show there is a level. Again, turning it off and back on fixes that as well.

I have had nothing but problems trying to get their stagebox and mixer to work together. Worked fine at first, but then started to experience problems with the clock syncing. Spent days swapping cables and trying different runs. Spent a long time on the phone waiting to just talk to their technical support, ended up hanging up after close to two hours in their queue. Finally got a response from their messaging system online though after some time. Came down to the cable in our walls not being CAT5e or better, so I replaced all the cable with CAT6, which fixed the problem... at first. No problem during the few days of testing. No problems during most of the sound check, but then at the end, audio blipped out again, due to a clock sync issue. Then again near the end of the concert. I know this particular problem is probably a combination of PreSonus and my organizations problems, but still would much rather be working with digital snake options that use Dante instead of AVB.

Their app is not the most user friendly when using an iPad, but not terrible. My major problems with it are when adjusting knobs though, it pops up a slider window, which then prevents you from modifying anything else unless you press randomly somewhere else, then repress what you need to quickly adjust. Most noticeable when adjusting a knob for something, but then you hear feedback and need to quickly mute or bring down a fader. My instinct is to quickly bring down a fader or press mute, but nothing will happen when you do that until you let your finger off the screen again, then the slider window disappears and you now can press mute (again) or bring the slider down (again). On an android phone, the app is even worse. They shrink down all the faders so they can fit more on the screen, which make it really hard for your fingers to click on anything that you actually want to click on. It just isn't optimized like it should be.

Maybe I just have had the only bad experiences, but I just can't recommend PreSonus. It was the cheaper option though, which is why we ended up with it to begin with. It is probably fine for consumer-sided things, but it just doesn't have that professional-quality experience with it.


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## Jay Ashworth (Dec 17, 2019)

You are not the only person to dis Presonus boards; I hear a low rumble of discontent about them in lots of quarters.


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## TimMc (Dec 17, 2019)

Jay Ashworth said:


> You are not the only person to dis Presonus boards; I hear a low rumble of discontent about them in lots of quarters.


It's well deserved. They should have stuck to building interfaces, converters and other digi-dodads.


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## NickVon (Dec 21, 2019)

The Soundcraft Performer 3 I believe can hit up to 64 channels for sub 5k$ . But as based on the other discussions here i think you can see the quality and usability of a 64 channel console priced that low. It's not great and I wouldn't recommend it, and I hate mixing on it at local high school that as one. But it's an option...... i suppose..... if you hate your self and others, and generally just want to spread discord around you.


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