Portability for live recording

[jmandoman]

I'm looking for ideas and advice.

I've got a home studio with an expanded VS880 but the small 540m hard drive. I back up to 100m Zips via the SCSI interface and mix down to either minidisc on a portable Sharp minidisc recorder or direct into my laptop/Cakewalk Pro 9. I burn CDs using Adaptec software to the CD-R/RW drive in the laptop. I've recorded, mixed, and created my band's demo CD with this setup successfully.

I like the sound quality I get with the VS880 and am happy with the CDs I've produced. However, the VS880 is limited in the number of tracks I can record simultaneously and is a bit of a pain to take 'on the road' and set up for recording gigs and impromptu practices.

I'm considering the Alesis LX20 as my portable solution. My thinking is that I can put it in a small rack case and cable it up to my Mackie 1604 vlz pro at gigs and practices without much fuss. Forty minutes recording on a S-VHS tape would pretty much capture a set.

The unknowns:
While I need 10 tracks to cover all the channels we use on the Mackie for gigs, will I be able to survive with 8 on the LX20?

Will I be able to move the tracks to the VS880 to utilize the features/FX I've come to know and love there?

I've got about $500 I can spend on this. From the activity I've seen on eBay and Digibid I can get an LX20 between $350 and $500. Is there a better solution within my budget?

[Track Rat]

I'm biased because I use ADATs. I like 'em just fine. It seems to me if you already have a front end for it (the Mackie), then for $350 to $500 it'd be hard to go wrong. I've never had my hands on a 880. If it has a lightpipe option, then you can get your tracks in digitally.

[MiXit-G]

..and if you need 10 channels you'll probly just have to buss 2 mics down to a single track here or there.