Any effect that you put on before the recording will be on there permantly, if you are using the mixer you will be able to add the onboard effects to the tracks, say a guitar by assigning the effect and then turning the channel FX knob to add the effect to the corresponding channel. The problem with that mixer is that you can only assign one effect at a time. However you have got Auxilery sends and returns, which means that you can hook another, maybe a few effects pedals or units, even computer based effects software to these inputs. This way you can get alot more from your mixer. One word of caution tho is when you are recording in this way you have to make a decision whether to "track" Dry or Wet because like i said anything that goes to tape stays there. i would suggest recording straight any part that needs to be effected in this way. This way you will have alot more scope for mixing. hope this is of use to you.