I have a Phonic 2443A mixer that appears to have some sort of routing problem. Yeah I know, Phonic, hahaha...OK. I bought this cheap on purpose cause I just needed it in my personal home project studio for some things. If it is broke then i'll buy something else but out of curiosity I wanted to know how some of you pros would trace down an issue like this.
If I plug a device into any of the 16 channel inputs, the audio for that device will not appear at the main stereo outs. However, if I select the Submix 1 button for whatever channel the device is connected to, then on Submix 1, select the L/R button (which sends whatever is being routed to Submix 1 to the main stereo outs), magically, the device appears.
In other words, it's as though the "direct line" from each channel to the main stereo outs is broken...but the line from each channel to submix 1 is OK, and the line from submix 1 to the main stereo outs is OK, and so I *can* get the audio there eventually if I push it through a roundabout route.
How would I go about testing something like this to see if I might could find where the breakdown is occurring? Using a tone gen and a probe or something like that on the circuit board?
-Ben
Comments
76: Welcome to the forum! If I am understanding you correctly, t
76:
Welcome to the forum! If I am understanding you correctly, there is NO "stereo mix" assign button on each channel, right? Yeah, that's a cost-cutter to be sure, but one that you will have to deal with. I have run across many boards in the past that did that, specifically, YAMAHA's original PM series boards (Phonic is a subsidiary of theirs!) and some Brit boards that cut costs by not having a channel-to-stereo bus assign button. It kinda sux because it forces you to route the signal through more half-assed opamp circuitry than you need, and that just adds noise and minimizes headroom. All I can say is good luck...and you don't wanna mess with those guts, anyway!
Thanks guys. I guess I never really even considered the possibil
Thanks guys. I guess I never really even considered the possibility that it wasn't *supposed* to do that! Haha. I didn't know cheap mixers had that "feature". As for mine, I can't find anything that says it does or does not, so i'm not sure. Each channel has On/Off, Submix 1/2, Submix 3/4, and Solo buttons. Nothing for L/R but I guess I just assumed that was because by default it will already route to L/R.
Um....are you sure there IS a "direct line" from the channel str
Um....are you sure there IS a "direct line" from the channel strips? On my Mackie 32-8, there's a L/R assign button and seperate sub assign buttons.......but on my Mackie CFX12, there are only sub assigns. I have to route the channels through Subs 1&2 to get to main outs, just the way some small boards are built.