HI Since Im looking for an Analog-Mixer and try to make sense of the terms and specs,
I have some Mixer-questions..
*What is PFL? I read some mixer-manual, still cant make anything out of it.
Is it to hear the incomming signal without effect/ and EQ ?
PFL = Pre Fader Listen. At least on my Yamaha board, when you are listening through headphones, engaging PFL will stop all channels not engaged with PFL from coming to the headphone mix, and you will hear exactly what is coming in the line-in or microphone input of the channels that currently have it enabled. You won't hear EQ applied, or any aux sends, nor will the volume be affected by the fader on that channel.
*If I have a 8-track recorder, Can I do with a 8-channel mixer and 1 stereo bus?
How do they setup X-track with N-Channel mixers anyway in a working environment?
What kind of 8-track recorder do you have? I have a couple Tascam digital tape decks, each of which handles 8 channels of I/O. The bare-minimum I like to have (for a single unit for live work) is a mixer with 8 mono channels, 1 for each track of the tape deck, a master stereo bus (which is on virtually every mixer - it is the main output of the thing), and some sort of auxiliary bus, for using external effects units.
For a more in-depth explanation, I would need to know what recorder you have to help ya out.
Do I need to replug wires to channels continuously when recording to multitrack and then replug when I want to master?
Again, its all dependant on the setup. I have two of those tape decks chained together, giving me 8 tracks x2 machines. The output of each channel of the two tape decks runs out to a channel on my 24-track board, via the line-inputs. I use external preamps for any mics I am recording with, so I don't need to unplug a thing from the board. I just plug the output of a preamp into one of the input on whichever tape deck contains the track I want to write to, and I hit record.
*What are the Aux-send buttons for? To send the signal to multitrack?
And will it be pre or post EQ+effects?
Depends on the mixer for specific details, but in general, if the channel itself just has a button to engage Aux 1, Aux 2, etc., that just means that the output of that particular channel can be routed to an auxiliary output as well as to the stereo output.
If you look at the physical connections of whatever mixer you might be looking at or have, you'll see that there are jacks on it labelled "Aux 1 send" and some sort of Aux-return. If you were to, say, hook up an external digital reverb's input to the Aux 1 output jack, and wire the output of the reverb unit to the Aux return, then turn up the volume knob for "Aux return", you could then send the audio from that channel through the reverb, and mix in the return sound with the final stereo output of the mixer.
As for what part of the channel still processes the audio before it actually gets sent to the auxiliary channel, I don't know exactly. On my Yamaha desk, the signal that gets sent to the auxiliary channels is post-fader, meaning that the EQ and the volume set by the fader effects the signal before sending it to any auxiliary buses (auxiliary outputs). This is so, in the case of the reverb unit, when you pull the fader down on a particular track, the level going out to that reverb unit goes down as well, so everything stays properly balanced.
Oh, no problem. Just doing my... job?
