Mackie 1604-VLZ Pro

[hand in glove]

Hey Guys,

Just firstly like to thank those who helped me choosing the Mackie 1604 VLZ pro over the crappy behringer/yamaha stuff. Its great! I'm loving it!

Anywho, just curious with one thing on the desk, i've noticed on the lower part of the faders, when it comes to tracks 9-16, it has labelled "track 1, through to track 8", whats this mean on the desk?

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

Hey Guys,

Just firstly like to thank those who helped me choosing the Mackie 1604 VLZ pro over the crappy behringer/yamaha stuff. Its great! I'm loving it!

Anywho, just curious with one thing on the desk, i've noticed on the lower part of the faders, when it comes to tracks 9-16, it has labelled "track 1, through to track 8", whats this mean on the desk?

That's just a throwback to the days when ADAT, DA88s and other 8-track tape recorders were king. The 1604 was originally designed to fit with 8-track decks like a hand in glove (coinidence?!?! )

Anyway the idea was that a common wiring scheme using the 1604 with an 8-track was to run the direct outs available on channels 1-8 out to the deck for tracking purposes, then routing the outputs from the deck back into channels 9-16 of the mixer, using those channels to mix the playback of the tape at will. It really was a very compact and convenient scheme that required no re-wiring.

So those numbers are just a handy reference to indicate that those are your playback channels of tape tracks 1-8 *if that is how you have your setup wired*. If you are using your mixer in a different configuration, you can just ignore those numbers, they are meaningless. They don't actually refer to any internal wiring or routing or other internal functionality. They are just there as a printed guide *IF* you have your mixer wired for 8-track I/O as described above.

G.

 

[dachay2tnr]

Anyway the idea was that a common wiring scheme using the 1604 with an 8-track was to run the direct outs available on channels 1-8 out to the deck for tracking purposes, then routing the outputs from the deck back into channels 9-16 of the mixer, using those channels to mix the playback of the tape at will. It really was a very compact and convenient scheme that required no re-wiring.

That's exactly how I have my Mackie setup to work with my Delta 1010. Direct outs from channels 1-8 go to the Delta inputs, and the outputs go back to channels 9-16.

Allows me to use outboard fx on channels 9-16 without printing them on the recording (which is taken from channels 1-8). Also allows you to raise/lower the listening volume on any item in the mix, without affecting the recording volume.

 

[hand in glove]

Ah i see, that makes sense. Yeah where i study the mackie 24-8 is set up like that. I also have a delta 1010, so i might give that setup a whirl like dachay2tnr has done.

The 1604 was originally designed to fit with 8-track decks like a hand in glove (coinidence?!?! )

Hahaha, yes very nice coincidence!

 

[dachay2tnr]

Ah i see, that makes sense. Yeah where i study the mackie 24-8 is set up like that. I also have a delta 1010, so i might give that setup a whirl like dachay2tnr has done.

Just make sure that channels 1-8 on the Mackie are not assigned to the Main Mix. Otherwise you will be getting output from both the direct connections and the returns from the Delta. Only assign channels 9-16.