Reginald, that's an excellent question. It really depends on the faders printed markings on the console top. If the top travel of the fader indicates zero turned all the way up, that's where the Master fader should be.

If on the other hand the highest setting indicates 10 at the top? And you notice that there is a zero only two thirds of the way up, the fader should be set to zero, or two thirds of the way up.

Those are the output amplifiers unity gain position and is the proper settings for the master outputs.

You'll notice that all of the other faders on most consoles indicate zero two thirds of the way up. Those are the proper positions for tracking and mixing if you adjust your gain trim controls, accordingly. This optimizes the internal amplifiers working parameters. If your faders are too high or too low, then, gain trims should be adjusted to try and position the fader as close as possible to the zero position. This will give you optimum headroom and signal-to-noise.

Now you're cooking with gas
Ms. Remy Ann David