Behringer, a jem or crap?

[MrStitch]

Our band has one of their mixers... for live use, it's great. The overal volume level of the instruments far outweigh the noise of the mixer.

On the other hand, assuming that absolutley everyone here is interested in home recording ONLY, then stay away.

I've tried it on my comp, and the noise level is sort of a battle.

But hey.... if i wanna sound good, for me, i think i just better stick to playing, instead of fiddling with all kinds of junk to 'hide' my mistakes. =)

 

[CoolCat]

But hey.... if i wanna sound good, for me, i think i just better stick to playing, instead of fiddling with all kinds of junk to 'hide' my mistakes. =)

yeah, simpler is best sometimes for me too. and mixes are much easier.
my most tolerable stuff is a drum set, bass, one guitar recording. always seem to have the best recordings.....
but then i always start adding more and then its ASS again. sometimes i get close with 4-5 tracks but rarely...and i have 24!

 

[kaminari13]

behringer tube mic pre amp

the behringer mic tube pre-amp is a great piece of equipment if your looking for that wall of white noise sound ,you can get better warmth by going through an old tape deck rec level pre.

 

[CoolCat]

the behringer mic tube pre-amp is a great piece of equipment if your looking for that wall of white noise sound ,you can get better warmth by going through an old tape deck rec level pre.

that cracked me up...the old straight man comedy...

if your looking for the wall of white noise sound...hehee

 

[BeatsBuY]

From my experience, the mixers have a lot of noise and die faster. I had one mixer and it smoked! Ya, all the channels fried for no reason. I told Guitar Center that I needed a new mixer because the Behringer died and the guy said,"Oh, it finally went out on you." THANKS A LOT FOR SELLING IT TO ME WHEN YOU NEW IT WOULD DIE OUT ON ME! But, the old saying is right. "YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR." I have an old Allen and Heath mixer I've had for 8 years. I work that mixer every day. Never had a problem with it. But, the Allen & Heath ran me $1000. The Behringer only $150. Ya, I see the difference...

The mixers they make may not be that good. But some of the other products are good. Like some of the preamps they make. I have the 8 channel mic pre. NOT BAD!

 

[talontsiawd]

I find behringer gear to be fine for it's price. All my stuff i've replaced has been better but i still think that they make good entry level gear. It's also cheap enough that you can buy something and use it and if you want to upgrade, you didn't waste your money really. For some reason it is quite easy to get rid of for a decent price. I've been content with anything i've purchaced for the price. Remember, when you talk about this sort of gear, you really need to realize what you spent on it. People also say their stuff breaks. I've had no problems with any of the behringer gear i've bought ever. I had a mixer for 3 years and sold it to a friend about a year ago. Still going strong. Now i know 4 years doesn't mean alot when you are talking about high end gear but this is a $50 mixer. I thought i was taking a huge chance and it would last 4 months or something. My compressor i got for free is still going strong, i plan on replacing it, i'm just waiting for it to crap out and it never does. I imagine it's atleast 5-6 years old. I know behringer=Crap to most people but for those who are not willing to invest more than $2000 in a studio, including software and what not, i find it works well enough.

 

[fldrummer]

What do you expect?

The company must have a VERY low R&D budget because everything they make is just something another company made and they just cut everything down so it costs pennies.

You get stuff cheap because it's very cheaply made and the ideas are stolen from other companies.

I've used some of the gear before. The mixers are very poor! When I was dialing in monitor mixes the guys were freakin out because the pots were so sketchy.

Some stuff might end up being decent sounding because its just another companies idea!!!

 

[qb2k5]

From my experience, the mixers have a lot of noise and die faster. I had one mixer and it smoked! Ya, all the channels fried for no reason. I told Guitar Center that I needed a new mixer because the Behringer died and the guy said,"Oh, it finally went out on you." THANKS A LOT FOR SELLING IT TO ME WHEN YOU NEW IT WOULD DIE OUT ON ME! But, the old saying is right. "YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR." I have an old Allen and Heath mixer I've had for 8 years. I work that mixer every day. Never had a problem with it. But, the Allen & Heath ran me $1000. The Behringer only $150. Ya, I see the difference...

The mixers they make may not be that good. But some of the other products are good. Like some of the preamps they make. I have the 8 channel mic pre. NOT BAD!

Been using my 602a for yrs. Recording numerous of rap and r&b albums with it and it's pres. Since it doesnt have any power switch I left it on 24/7 for yrs. No problems. Quiet pre-amps. Lots of people who hear me and my clients songs think it was recorded from a real pro studio.

my opinon.

 

[jwgeetar]

I've had the MX802A mixer for 5 years. i don't always use it but when i do and have, it works just fine. My Boss 7band EQ died last year so i'm gambling on the Berhinger one for $19---I JUST ORDERED today!!!

i am not gonna stomp on it at my gigs (sits on the PA table) so hopefully it'll be ok. the only thing that would piss me off is if it hissed real loud. I'm a one man band accoustic guy......! i hate it when my ballads have hissing noise in'em.....just hate it...

i'll get back when it comes in--stay tuna kiddies

 

[RockStarzUSA]

I love and hate Behringer gear. I used to anage a large East Coast M.I store. We did around 9 stock turns of Behringer gear a year, so the gear was popular, more people were getting a greater degree of tools to use via Behringers pricing....

However....

Behringer failure rate was around 60% in three months and over 90% in 12 months. In other words in the 800 units we sold, over 700 of them came in for warranty work within 1 year, and over 480 came back in 3 months or less!!

So, it was a double edged sword. The end user got more gear, but they also got more hassles....

I am sure they have oimproved over the last year or two, but that was the state of affirs a while ago.

 

[PATRIOT2006]

I own a Behringer single channel parametric eq and a dual channel compressor/limiter with noise gate. I have had them for at least five years. I have never noticed any increased noise or hiss from the units. They, in my opinion do what they are supposed to do. With that said, if I had other gear to compare it to and was recording professionally then I assume I may hear a big difference but for my home studio the recordings sound fine. I admit I am and probably will always be a novice but the equipment seems to meet my needs. Now, if I can only figure out the 60 cycle hum problem I get when I turn on my Alesis RA100 monitor power amp I would have a dead quiet system. Luckily for me the hum doesn't get picked up in recordings. I only hear it while using the monitors.
I feel their is alot of great advise here on the forum but sometimes the negative comments about specific brands tend to have us newbies spinning in circles. We are just trying to get a decent recording in are small home studios with a limited budget and nothing more at this point in time.
For instance, I heard alot of negative things about the blue tube preamp I was considering. That advise was great, it was also specifically explained as to why it is a poor unit to own. Other Presonus equipment is knocked but noone ever says what is wrong with it. Maybe what is wrong for a professional studio isn't so bad for a home studio with a guy like myself recording only solo guitar or with a sequencer. Just my .02. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate all the advise I have had in my short stay here so far.

 

[ericlingus]

I have a Vamp2 and a 210 Vtone amp. I have had the amp for a little over a year and the v amp for about 9 months and so far have had no problems. Well one time the amp wouldnt remember the presets I made for each channel but I reset the FX and it worked fine every since. No problems with the Vamp. No noise. Maybe the people who were experiencing noise werent using the noise gate? I dunno. But my vamp2 if very quiet. Same with my amp. I think they both are great deals. I think they sound great and well worth the money!

 

[mawd]

Hi....I went to backyard BBQ recently and there was a couple of young
bands there....mostly school kids....most of their gear was Behringer. Sounded fine...in fact, one of the best parties I've been to in a long time.
MAWD

 

[warble]

...Now, if I can only figure out the 60 cycle hum problem I get when I turn on my Alesis RA100 monitor power amp I would have a dead quiet system. Luckily for me the hum doesn't get picked up in recordings. I only hear it while using the monitors.

Are you using balanced cables? You also might try something like one these to alleviate the ground loop issue (hum):

http://www.americanmusical.com/item--i-EBT-HUMX--s-ebtech.html
http://www.americanmusical.com/item--i-EBT-HE--s-ebtech.html

I use the one in the second link, and have had one for years. I use it specifically for my Yamaha S80 keyboard now, and it cleans up hum that seems to creep in. The rest of my system is hum free, but I'd use one anywhere there might be an issue. The eliminator doesn't affect/degrade the signal in any way.

 

[PATRIOT2006]

I was wondering if the hum eliminator was any good. I must admit that to me it doesn't sound like a 60 cycle hum. More buzzy sounding but I don't know much about it. All I can tell you is the monitor send is off and I still here it through the speakers when I turn the channel volumes up on the power amp. When I turn the monitor send up to use them it doesn't increase the noise level at all so I assume it has to be the amp. If I did not mention it earlier it is an Alesis RA100.

 

[snoid]

using a behringer v-ampire lx1200 amp head, v-amp 2, fcb 1010 midi controller and a behringer mixer here. No problems with any of them over the last year or so. As reliable as any of the other gear I've got. Oh I have one of their effects pedals, the flanger. It's not so good, works reliably just sounds bad.

 

[cubanorocker316]

it depends ion what ur buying the pa and keyboard amps are decent, but the guitar amps or any guitar products for that matter are crap, the recording equiopment from them is good IMO

 

[lion_tone]

I think "skill" has a lot to do with sound. I've heard great mixes come out of Alesis Monitor One's...not because the monitors were great (on any level) but because the engineers ears were accustomed to them.

I've used several pieces of their gear, and for the most part, it's ok to good. Their "truth" monitors work well as they should, and their ADA8000 works very very nice.

Their GI100 guitar direct box (the red one) with the 4X12 emulation is SICK good....$35 too!

 

[Toki987]

I wonder how many people noticed, and how much of the beh gear was used with the bands at the grammy's......

 

[elijahblue]

Behringer = Good stuff

We ran our pirate radio station using Behringer mixers for about 5 years. Overall, they worked great. We beat the crap out of them. We put them in little boxes (with a computer and a transmitter) in people's back yards through winter and summer (-10 degree's to 100 degree's plus) running 24X7 and the Behringer mixers held up great.

We had dozens of newbie DJ's who had no clue how to use studio equipment, who spilled beer into the mixers, sat on them, every abuse you could imagine, and the Behringer mixers kept on working, and working well.

And the sound? Not bad. For a sample check out some of the recordings we made of bands live on air at:

http://www.clickcaster.com/clickcast/rss/237

This was no pro-audio operation. It was a few audio experts and mostly total amatuers running things, but the equipment held up like a champ (and the original mixers are still around being used by bands made up of ex KBFR DJ's.

Personally, I think their pricing and marketing tend to put off the pro's. It's sort of the difference between owning a Acura or a Honda. You're getting really similar products, but you're paying for the brand.

If you're INTO that.... you know, the image thing, great. It's your money, spend as you see fit. But having beaten the hell out of Behringer equipment for years and it just keeps chugging along, I'm not buying that it's crap.

EB