Mixerless Setup For A Band?

[Nick Danforth]

I'm looking into possibly moving towards a mixerless setup for recording my band. Currently, I'm running everything into a Mackie 1642-VLZ3 and then into a basic 2x2 soundcard in/out of my computer, but I'm looking for more flexibility in my recording and my signal chain.

The thing I like about having the mixer setup is the ability I have to have everything in the control room (which is also our rehearsal room) fully connected into the system at all times, and I'd like to know how I could accomplish that with a mixerless interface setup.

I wouldn't like to spend a ton. I don't have an exact budget right now, and I don't want to sacrifice a ton of quality for a cheaper route, but once decent quality is achieved, the cheaper the better.

So here's the meat of my question:

If I do go mixerless, what are my best options, or should I try to modify my existing mixer based setup?

 

[wheelema]

You are not looking for a 'mixerless' setup, you are looking to capture all of the tracks in the DAW. This may... or may not... involve a mixer.

For example Mackie has a firewire attached mixer that gives you both the physical hands on functionality of a mixer yet allows you to manipulate each track independently in the DAW.

Hit up www.tweakheadz.com.

 

[oretez]

far from a complete treatment but if you are tracking multiple voices simultaneously how are you going to create an acceptable monitor chain without some kind of 'mixer'?

e.g. you might want to record nine drum tracks all dry and as close to 0 dB as possible but in everyone's monitor mix you might sub those to accent just kick and snare

e.g. 2, generally speaking most vocalists performer 'better' with some reverb on their vocal (in their monitors) . . . what you fold back to them is certainly not what you want to have as your only track

e.g. 4 . . . latency in monitor mix

each of these and dozens of others are issues that can be addressed conveniently with a 'mixer' and become increasingly, even geometrically (as you add issues) more difficult without

with a powerful enough computer (and enough powerful enough computers) your 'mixer' can be 'virtual' (for which majority of individuals then go out of their way to find a hardware control of some type (doesn't have to look exactly like a traditional mixer)

at entry level a physical old school mixer tends to be more cost effective

if you are only tracking a single voice at a time chances are you don't need an external hardware mixer (though even then you might find one useful)

 

[Minion]

If your mixer has Direct outs for each channel you can just get a 8 in/8 out Sound card and connect the Outs of each channel into the In"s on the sound card .....

Just a thought.....

 

[Nick Danforth]

I've had another option presented to me, but I don't know whether it's viable.

What an audio interface + small mixer to set up monitoring, and then a patch bay that I can connect everything to, and patch it the way I like it when recording?

 

[Nick Danforth]

So I've been doing some research, and an interface + XLR patchbay + TRS patchbay looks like a pretty good option (maybe upgrade to a control surface instead down the line?), but I'm not really sure about it.

Could I get some advice?

 

[timthetortoise]

A patchbay != preamps, and you need preamps to go into the interface. Patchbays are for easier access in racks, and are completely unessential.
What your setup will most likely look like is:
Microphones/Instruments -> Preamp -> Interface -> Computer
Whether the preamps are included in the interface completely depends on the interface itself. If the interface does not have built-in preamps, you must get at least one preamp per channel you want to use a microphone through (and in most cases, a 4/8 channel preamp will be what you want when you're doing a small setup. Much more convenient than buying a bunch of individual pres).