MACKIE 1402 Question(s)

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Ace2000

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Hello,
This may be a simple question, Im sure some fo you may find it comical but here goes....since this is specific to my gear and lack of expertise, I could really find anything in the search to really answer it.

I have a Fostex VF-16, it has 8 channel inputs. Im thinking of buying a Mackie 1402....will this mixer work with my Fostex?
Like, is there enough Direct outs on the Mackie, to do justice?
Or would a mixer with at least 8 direct outs be more appropriate. I do, however want the Mackie Pre's, but cant afford a 1604 or the like. The 1402 is in my price range. So, would any of you think that optimum performance would be had by sending everything out of the Mackie in a Stereo mix? I mean this is how I would have to send the signals out of the M<ackie and into my Fostex right? through the ALT 3/4 out?

SHould I go for the Mackie 1402, or would something with more direct outs be more appropriate???

Is that correct? I'm sure some of you have waay more experience with this than I do.

Here's a psuedo application setting:

I wanna use 6 mics to record the drums with. Suppose I hook them into the Mackie, add a little gating and compression in the inserts (it does have inserts right?) then send the signal to the Fostex for recording... Now I have my drums recorded on the Fostex in channels 1-6, right? is the mixer a waste of money, or would I be better off just pluggin the mics in direct into the Fostex? Can I use the EQ on the Mackie to color the drums before they hit my recorder?

Im just teetering on indecision as to whether or not to buy the Mackie

any help great, GREATLY appreciated!


thanks.
 
Inserts send the signal pre/EQ and Fader
Direct outs send the signal Post EQ and Fader

The alt buss and any busses can only send 2 discreet tracks but the will be post EQ/Fader/Insert.

If you want 6 discreet sends with EQ and Compression you need a board with 6 inserts and direct outs or enough busses to send seperate mixes. It does get a little confusing because many of the compact mixers allow you to do a lot of tricks to get what you need.

Check the mackie website because they have great hook up diagrams.

Hopefully that will help you spec the mixer to see if it will do what you want.
 
What WOuld you do?

well, a dealer has kinda sold me on a Bheringer Eurodesk, the 2242...

I need tp go where my dolar will take me.
should I take the Bheringer or shell outy an extra few for a Mackie 1604??

what would you do? mean, Bheringer does a great Picasso for those who have never seen Picasso? and what's wrong with that?

should I just get a 1604 instead or what?

all opinions welcomed...
thanks for your time.
 
I'll leave my personal opinion of Behringer out of this for the moment. I suppose it comes down to a question of what level of quality you can settle for. i see it like this. I looked at both the models you mentioned, the Mackie 1402 and the Behringer 2242.
On the behringer's side, it will give you 16 mic inputs and it's only redeaming factor, it has an insert on the channels with mic pre's, so for multi tracking purposes, this would give you essentially 16 direct outputs to feed a recorder.
The Mackie has 6 mic pre's and they're equiped with inserts but only 6. My humble opinion is they're much better pre's than the Behri's, but only 6. The Behringer will get you up and running fast but the Mackie would probably serve you better in the long haul (if you get the recording bug, this WON'T be your last purchase by a long shot. Mic pre amps are a thing to be lusted after).
Just my humble opinion, YMMV.
 
Well, y'know, the Mackie has no inserts..I'm sure that makes it useless to a lot of people. I need the effects in there. Bheringer is willing to give you pretty much a note for note replication of a Mackie. but a Mackie is probaby more rugged. But for a savings of a few hundred bucks, who isnt willing to be a little more careful around sensitive knobs and stuff?

I mean, if the Berringer is so closeley modelled after a Mackie, should the pre's be just as or nearly as good as the mackie's?

I don't make music for techies...I've never heard anyone say that the guitar intro or solo would have sounded better with (insert brand X) mixing console. The average listener just doesnt listen to music on those terms. And some people here and out there are so blinded by consumerism they'd walk into George Martins studio and say the gear The Beatles recorded on was crap....

I'm just more interested in knowing if The Berringer is a good functioning pieve of gear...anyone out there using one care to give me some insight?

Any of you macki 1402 users care to tell me how you work around the channel insert thing? how do you get by without them?
 
The mackies do have inserts on every channel with a preamp. Fuck Behringer. Get a Mackie or Soundcraft M and you wont be dissapointed. Recording is about sound first and features second.
 
I went to two different dealers today, and both said that the Mackie 1402 or the 1202 do not have channell inserts.
You have to get the 1604 for the channell inserts.

This is what they told me, then the Bheringer for it's price range became more appealing.

Doesnt the Bheringer sound good? is the average listener going to noticce it? I mean, some fo you guys have the million dolar set up witha shitty Sqieur electric plugged into it. Whats the point of that?

Is a bherringer going to make my 62 Strat and Marshall JTM 45 witha 57 in the front of the cab, is it going to make it sound lame?

I think playing a japanese guitar into a USA made board is a lamer approach.

Seriously though, im recording guitar driven rock n roll....will the berringer fall short? I need the inserts and the dealers said the Mackie dont have them unless you get the 1604 - which is more expensive..for the price of a 1402 I can geta brand new berigner
 
Ace2000 said:
Is a bherringer going to make my 62 Strat and Marshall JTM 45 witha 57 in the front of the cab, is it going to make it sound lame?

I think playing a japanese guitar into a USA made board is a lamer approach.
Click to expand...

You rang?

You will kick yourself for buying the Behringer. They are noisy, fragile, and the midrange sounds terrible.

You're right that no one will say "Hey this song sucks 'cause it wasn't tracked on a Neve!"

They'll just say "This sounds like crap."

Don't make the same mistake I did. Save up for a Soundcraft, Mackie, or Allen & Heath. Go used if you have to.
 
Ace2000 said:
I went to two different dealers today, and both said that the Mackie 1402 or the 1202 do not have channell inserts.
You have to get the 1604 for the channell inserts.
Click to expand...
This is complete BULLSHIT. All Mackie mixers have inserts on the channels with preamps. The 1202 has 4 and the 1402 has 6. Now you get my opinion of Behringer mixers. They blow dead goats. They completly suck. To say they're a piece of shit mixer is an insult to piece of shit mixers. Like I said, it's a matter of what level of quality you'll settle for. If Behringer is "good enough", then boogie on. They're definately NOT good enough for me.
Just my humble opinion. YMMV.
 
Well, thanks for the responses guys!

I've used Mackie's before. I like them.....But I need to invest ina board to us mostly for recording, but some live use as well.

I just don't see how a Bherringer can be so bad......

is anybody here using one with good results? have you been pleased with the board?

And yes, the dealers told me the Mackie1402 had no inserts which totally made the prospect of having one, useless to me. I couldnt figure out why Mackie wouldnt put inserts into there boards....

you guys say Mackie, the voice in my head says, not much ofa difference except for price...


what exactly is wrong with the Berringer?

has everyone who has used one come to the comnclusion thatit sucks?


what do you think of the Mackie 1202? should I get that?
Im ina rock band and will be using the most amount of mics at one time to simply track the drums, a 5 piece kit.

for the money should I get a smaller board like the Mackie 1202, or would I be better of getting more optins with the Berringer? please help

They have a 1202 in the store I can grab it today, it doesnt have sliders, but so what? it has the clean preamps right?
or should I go with the berringer?

what would you suggest? it will mostly be a board for digitall recording my rock band. will the 1202 be enough?
 
Last edited:
Ace2000 said:
And yes, the dealers told me the Mackie1402 had no inserts which totally made the prospect of having one, useless to me. I couldnt figure out why Mackie wouldnt put inserts into there boards....
Click to expand...

Although you may have realized it, the way you stated this makes it seem like you didn't.

THE MACKIES HAVE INSERTS

you guys say Mackie, the voice in my head says, not much ofa difference except for price...
Click to expand...

There's no such thing as a free lunch.
You get what you pay for.

what exactly is wrong with the Berringer?

has everyone who has used one come to the comnclusion thatit sucks?
Click to expand...

No, not everyone. However, MANY have come to this conclusion.
A few reasons:

1. Poor quality control.
2. Crappy preamps.
3. Bleed through.


what do you think of the Mackie 1202? should I get that?
Im ina rock band and will be using the most amount of mics at one time to simply track the drums, a 5 piece kit.

for the money should I get a smaller board like the Mackie 1202, or would I be better of getting more optins with the Berringer? please help

They have a 1202 in the store I can grab it today, it doesnt have sliders, but so what? it has the clean preamps right?
or should I go with the berringer?

what would you suggest? it will mostly be a board for digitall recording my rock band. will the 1202 be enough?
Click to expand...

The 1202 will be better than the Behringer. It has 4 inserts. Thus, you can use the aux sends as another output to be able to record 6 tracks of drums.

I'd personally go for the 1402. In fact, I did years ago and still use it today.


Don't ever feel pressured into buying something. It looks like you're doing the right thing by investigating the purchase before buying.

Good luck.
 
I have been researching it a while and finally grabbed a Mackie 1202.....I don't need a big board, this one ought to do the trick.

YOU GUYS CONVINCED ME - and YES, it has the INSERTS right there on the back.

How could I right now make the best use of the 1202, a POD and a FOstex VF-16.

The fostex has 8 inputs, and an AUX out.

how can I hook up a little system with these three pieces to do some recording of guitar sounds???

thanks guys/gals
 
Do you have any mic's? What kind and how many?

After looking into the VF-16, I'm actually suprised you were considering the Behringer because it wouldn't improve much on the Fostex aside from giving you more XLR inputs. Depeding on your mic situation, the Mackie 1202 might not have even been necessary.

The basic setup is to run the inserts from the 1202 into the track inputs of the VF-16. You need at least 4 short unbalanced 1/2" cables. Plug one end of each cable halfway (up to the first click) into the inserts of the Mackie. Plug the other end of each cable into the desired 1/4" track input on the VF-16.

You can run the POD directly into one of the remaining 1/4" inputs of the VF-16.

For recording 6 tracks of drums: If you have 6 appropriate mics, you can run four through the Mackie XLR inputs and two through the VF-16 XLR inputs.
 
Okay then heres what i have got going
Can you tell me what you think of this system Im using?

Kick Drum Mic -Some AKG thing
Snare Mic - SM57
Three small Clip on tom mic's for each tom
A sm81 on the high hat
and one overhead Sm81

Thats 7 mics and with the Fostex and Mackie I have 6 XLR inputs with Phantom power. I can probably just run the Snare SM57 into a standard 1/4 input on either the Mackie or the Fostex, right???

Now here's how I would do it:
I will record the drum tracks onto the VF-16 after I've eq'd each drum and panned them properly witht he Mackie. Then I will send the recorded drum tracks out of the Fostex through the SPDIF and into my CUBASE system for a stereo track, then Hook the mackie up to my Tascam US-428 Controller and overdub everything else within CUbase to the stereo drum track I sent in from the VF-16.

Does this make sense?

I guess what I need to know is, will I be able to run the 4 drum inputs from the mackie, through a Noise Gate? I only have one noise gate, will this work for all the mics (4 XLR = One 1/4")plugged into the Mackie?

Plus, the Fostex pre's suck, so having the mackie for those alone I feel is worth it. And I ran the stereo outs of my POD into the Line Level in 5-6 of the Mackie, and intot my Monitors, and you know what, the stereo POD effects are way better now than they were just going into the Fostex for some reason.

We would use 7 or 8 mics at the most to recdord drums with, his kit is only a 5 piece - so do i have enough power between the Vf-16 and the Mackie 1202?

Can I send all 5 mics in the Mackie througha Noise Gate so that when he hits the snare the mic doesnt give you the toms?

am I making any sense here?
 
Use the 2 SM81's as stereo overheads and don't worry about micing the HH.

You need a seperate noise gate for every channel if you want to use it.

Why are you submixing live? How many tracks can you record at once? You should just multitrack the drums for best mixing flexibility.
 
That's a lot of Q's for one post. ;)

Right, Tex.

You have the ability to record up to 8 tracks at once and 16 tracks total on the VF-16. At least for simplicity, I would record the drums onto individual tracks on the VF-16 without submixing or exporting. You can then record your remaining tracks on the VF-16.

Yes, you can run a mic that doesn't require phantom power into a 1/4" input by using an XLR:1/4" converter.

You can check in the Microphones forum for specific mic'ing questions.

Note: you can't pan the drums on the Mackie when using the inserts. You have to pan the individual tracks on the VF-16 once ther are recorded. (Unless you are trying to mix everything live to two tracks. If you are, I don't understand why you are using the VF-16).
 
OKay, thanks for responding, i am thankful for your advice.

Well, the VF-16 has some low EQ problems, they dont give you much conrtol over lower EQ's in the unit, so I want to tweak and adjust all sounds before they hit the VF-16. I have a Mackie 1202 so I can work with the sounds of drums and guitars and vocals before they even hit the VF-16. I just want the VF-16 for its 16 tracks and extra 8 Virtual Tracks. Its like having three ADAT machines, but better. The effects and EQ in the unit arte little bonus things I dont really need. I want to just use the VF-16 as a tracking device.

I do not want to send everything into the VF-16 and record them as a stereo track. I want to have each drum and over head on it's own corresponding track. I have 8 inputs on the vf-16 including 2 XLR inputs with Phantom power.

More or less, I want to know more about doing this with the Mackie 1202 as a mixer so I can tweak sounds before they hit the VF-16.

Then, I would send the tracks out of the VF-16 through the SPDIF and into my CUBASE system. you see, I have a Mackie 1202, Fostex VF-16 (for remote on location recording) as well as a CUBASE 5 system on PC. I use a TASCAM US-428 to control that and run MIDI SO, thats what Im working with.

How would you, using this set up, record a 5 piece drum set?

I want to also use a noise gate to isolate the mic sources, I dont want to have toms affecting the snare track, y'know what Im saying?

I usually use 8 tracks to record the drums with. but I want to have more control over there sound before they hit the VF-16, thats why I got a Mackie 1202 mixer...

did I make a big boo boo somewhere?

thanks for responding.
 
One problem is using the Mackie to EQ the drums is that the inserts are before the EQ section. Thus, any tracks you run out of the inserts cannot be EQ'ed on the Mackie.

One possible workaround is to use the Main and Aux outputs of the Mackie. You should be able to run two tracks on the stereo main outputs and two tracks on the aux outputs. These outputs will then include the EQ section of each channel. Unfortunately, that will only give you 4 EQ'ed tracks.

Also, if you are only using the VF-16 for remote recording and then importing into Cubase, you can use the Cubase EQ and noise gates after importing. You'll probably have to sync the VF-16 with Cubase and import two tracks at a time via S/PDIF.
 
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