After laughing at the lack of space depth dimension and girth from all in computer virtual mixing in a DAW, my partner and I bought a Neotek Elite. We decided that there were some things that we didn't dig on it, and it wasn't in the condition promised and needed a good amount of work. It went back the other day to its original owner and now we are looking again for a good console to mix out Nuendo Tracks to (bye bye PT).
A few friends have said that rather then looking for a large format console, we should consider some smaller and even cheaper consoles that have more minimal circuitry and good sound. Anyone here have any comments on that? How about some smaller console recommendations? Hows the Soundcraft 6000? Cad Maxon? Price range is from 3 to 10 thousand, thats pretty wide but its what it is, and we are looking to mix out 16 channels, so a 24 channel board would be fine. thanks for any help.
John
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I don't know what was wrong with the Elite, but if it was repair
I don't know what was wrong with the Elite, but if it was repairable, and the 'seller' would work with you to bring it to the condition in which it was represented, then it would probably be your best sounding option.
As for "A few friends have said that rather then looking for a large format console, we should consider some smaller and even cheaper consoles that have more minimal circuitry and good sound."
It's pretty tough to have "more minimal" anything, but I think I understand where you're going with that. This puts you in a pretty tough place unless you can get away with one (or two) of the Manley 16x 2 mixers, or on a budget, a Speck 'xtramix' (which has more features than the Manley).
I don't know if CAD is still making the Maxcon, it was a pretty good sounding desk (though the last time I played with one was about 10 years ago). As for the Soundcraft 6000, unless that Elite was severely fucked up, the Soundcraft 6000 couldn't lick the boots of an Elite.
A good rule of thumb I've found over the years... anything with the word "sound" in the name of the product, usually doesn't.
Good luck.