I Need Serious Help With Patch Bays

[crawdad]

Littledog--OK. I think I see a workable solution. Using a 24 channel mixer, I could use a 16 channel snake. 8 mic cables will go to the mixer pres. The other 8 will go to outboard pres. The balanced outs of those pres will go to the patch bay. From there, they can be routed to record ins on the digital interface. I can send the 1/4" balanced outs of the pres to channels 9-16 of the mixer. This will allow me to monitor those pres without latency. Channels 17-24 of the mixer will be for synths, drum machines, etc. These will have patch in points on the patch bay. Since the outboard pre's also have line in's, I will have additional inputs on the patch bay for those as well--just in case I need more line inputs (do we ever have enough?).

No phantom power issues. Still a flexible system. As for inserts, the outboard pre's I have are equipped with insert points, so I can wire up part of a bay for those instead of, or in addition to the mixer inserts on ch 9-16. Hmmm...I will want those mixer inserts when its mixing time, won't I? And I will want to hear what a compressor/EQ is doing to a pre-amp that is sending the "real" signal to the recorder.

Sorry to ramble. I'm thinking out loud just so you can follow my logic and say NO! if needed. You see, I've always worked either alone or with one person, a track at a time. Now that I am shooting for multitrack sessions, I want to adopt the patchbay and quit crawling around plugging things in and out all the time.

Alright--I think I'm done! Thanks to all for helping me see and think this through. Its going to be expensive and labor intensive to do this and I really want to do it right.

 

[Track Rat]

Crawdad, in a nut shell, here's how I have my set up. I have a 19" x 2U (3 1/2") plate with 16 XLRs panel mounted in it on the wall between the studio and controll room. Each hard wired to an individual mic pre and also 8 to 8 console pre's. The preamp line outs end up in the patch bay. All the console Direct outs, inserts and line ins are in the patch bay (the inserts normalled of course). The 8 console buss outs are in the bay as are the two buss inserts and main stereo outs (a seperate two track output goes straight to the monitor amp for the controll room). All the compressor ins and outs to the bay and the side chains there normalled through and all the delays and verbs and such. I also have a S/PDIF bay I built and plumbed with 75 ohm video cable on BNCs. It works without a hiccup.