Digital Mixer vs Analog Mixer

[LToro]

Give me a second..

[LToro]

If you ask me... well I will never use a digital mixer for anything serious

But high end analog and high end digital are practically identical!
Beck you don't know me and I respect your taste and analog ways. But I am willing to bet that you can't tell a high end digital signal from a high end analog one. I am sure you can't pick them apart. No one can..

[Bristol Posse]

Which has better quality Digital Mixer or Analog Mixer

By what objective, quantifiable measurement are you going to define better?
without that it's just opinion and emotion

[Beck]

But high end analog and high end digital are practically identical!
Beck you don't know me and I respect your taste and analog ways. But I am willing to bet that you can't tell a high end digital signal from a high end analog one. I am sure you can't pick them apart. No one can..

Actually nearly everyone who understands how each technology works and knows what to listen for can tell the difference. There are certain qualities and flaws in each technology that are peculiar to that technology. Many of the telltale signs are identical to ITB mixing vs. traditional OTB mixing.

When you have an all-digital setup, then yes, it becomes more difficult to tell which recording stage is contributing the most obvious objectionable artifacts. Of course I can pick them apart, just as I can compare different analog consoles side-by-side and have a preference. But comparing two analog mixers or two digital "mixers" involves different listening criteria.

[Mr Clean]

Don't you just love the "vs" questions. They're so fascinating!

[Bobbsy]

Don't you just love the "vs" questions. They're so fascinating!

Yeah, especially when, like this one, it's completely down to subjective opinion.

I'm certainly not going to come to the Analogue only forum and argue against analogue. As noted above, there are analogue mixers that I think sound great and would choose in an instant. However, what I won't do is argue that this is because analogue contains fewer artifacts. It's more to the point that the artifacts and distortions caused by analogue are very pleasing to the ear. Warmth, for example, isn't "accuracy"...it's actually a fault but a nice one to have.

If digital has a problem it's that it's too clean and accurate. However, on the good digital boards, a lot of attention is paid to the analogue sections--for example the pre-amps on the Midas Pro6 rival anything you'll hear on the best fully analogue mixer--and this makes a huge difference to the full signal path even though most of it is digital.

Anyhow, as I said earlier, analogue and digital are just tools. The decision between them is based on a mix of practical considerations and a lot of personal preference. Personally, I happily use either and won't generalise that either is automatically better.

[Mr Clean]

Never mind the fact that it's such a broad question, entirely based on peoples opinion and the OP hasn't stated any requirements of either such mixer or price willing he's to pay. May as well just put a poll up and got an average percentage of what people prefer.

[Chili]

Never mind the fact that it's such a broad question, entirely based on peoples opinion and the OP hasn't stated any requirements of either such mixer or price willing he's to pay. May as well just put a poll up and got an average percentage of what people prefer.

Yeah, The OP is almost trolling. He's going around asking pointless questions here and there... kind of getting on my nerve. But people are responding and in a good way, so not going to do anything yet.

[miroslav]

I think for live shows and especially more theatrical ones....digital mixers seem to get the nod these days because of the setting/recall capabilities. I work in IT by day, but one part of my IT world involves a 4,500 seat theater that hosts evrything from Country acts to Broadway shows and acrobatic troupes.
So when I poke my head in the theater during load in and sound checks...that's what I've seen lately.
Some of the more "traditional" music acts still tend to prefer all-analog mixers.

For pure recording/mixing, where I wanted the mixer to be part of, and add to, the flavor of the audio....?
Analog all the way.

[Farview]

In the studio, if I were to use a console for mixing, it would be analog. This is simply because I can't see much of a difference between a digital mixer and mixing ITB. With mixing ITB, I can choose which EQ and compression plugins, from an array of companies and designs, that I want to use for each instrument. On a digital mixer, you have the same thing on every channel.

For theater, digital all the way. Mostly because everything can be automated. There are so many times when a person mumbles in one scene and screams his head off in the next. I can program the gain structure differently for each scene, set the compression differently for each scene, have effects preset, etc... You can do that manually on an analog console for one or two channels, but once you get up to 40-50 channels in the show, it's just too much to keep up with without this kind of automation.