Behringer Xenyx X1204 USB

As a project, I play with an acoustic guitar, a small semimodular synth, and a loop pedal. I also play sometimes with a friend who has a modular synth and me with semimodular + looper.

The alt bus is the feature I was looking for the most, to be able to allways choose whether to send a channel to record with the looper. Allows us to play live with several channels and I can just pick one or two to record and loop while the others are left unchanged.

The sound quality is good enough for recording, I'll maybe edit this feedback once it will be tried in a live setting.

It's packed with features. Compressors for the mono channels do an okayish job if you don't need real control over it. The 3-band EQs are fine. Double AUX send: one AUX send and one FX send, both with returns, offer quite a bit of wiring options.
I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the built-in FX unit. I mostly used reverb so far, and it's great. I also didn't expect it, but you have some degree of control over each effect by being able to tune one or two parameters per effect.

In terms of outputs, I got surprised by the fact the main outputs are only XLR cables, but after a second thought it doesn't bother me at home since I record from USB and send to my home speakers via RCA, and for a live setting having an XLR output is the better option.

I can't go over all the features, there are too much, here's a list of which I use and how I use them
ALT 3/4 -> to send in the looper, coming back in a stereo channel
Builtin effect unit, mainly for reverb, with option to send the effects into the alt 3/4 (to have effects inside the looper, however the effects bleed into it) or only to main mix (with zero effect in the looper and therefore zero bleed)
Solo mode with prefader listen (to prepare a new modular synth voice before sending it into the mix for an improv situation)
Panning with synth voices for even more trippy loops.
All the connectivity: Ctrl Room, main mix, phones, RCA out, usb for recording...etc...
Compressor for my acoustic guitar channel when I use it, EQ for everything to try and keep the mix clean.

The usb out works in Linux, I record in Ardour (in case it helps someone, since some usb codecs are proprietary and don't work properly with Jack).

It is the first time I ever own or use a mixer, and I didn't have much problems figuring things out. However I have a scientific background, I did study some electronics on my own, and I did quite a bit of research before buying this unit because I wanted to be sure I had a good way to use my looper with it, all of this together may have helped to figure things down. The manual is nice and concise, however it's not a tutorial and doesn't explain anything: it only tells you what does what and never tells you how to use what. (There are some wiring examples for various settings though. Didn't check them since none really apply to my case).
With all this considered, it still felt a bit impressive the first time I sat in front of it haha!

Overall I'm super happy of this purchase. I'm getting everything I needed and a bit more for a price that is more than fair given all the features.

I'm using this mixer in live situations of 2-3 people in small bars and cafes. It does the job very well for the price. The control room features are very nice to have and help me a lot even though when I bought it I didn't think much about them. The same applies to the 3-4 outs, which turned out to be very useful when I needed weird routing of the outputs. The AUX out with pre-fade switch is a great tool for creating a monitor mix. The low-cut is another nice thing to have

Now the negatives.
I really miss having a knob for setting the middle EQ frequency. Sometimes I can't fix muddiness problems in vocals or harsh instruments because of this.
Another thing missing is the ability to EQ the FX, because the built-in hall reverb I'm using sometimes produces long reverberation on some frequencies that need taming, but I don't want to lower all of the effect.
Finally, I would like to be able to have more control over the compressor, because sometimes I need to lower the threshold without raising the volume as much as it does. Sometimes you have a quiet player who needs a lot of compression in order to sound steady, but then you have to turn the gain really low.

I have also used this mixer as an audio interface to record and mix songs at home. When I bought it I wanted one single device to do both things (live music and audio interface). The sound is okay I guess, but you can get much more clarity from a 24-bit audio interface like the UMC HD series.

Overall, If I was buying now, I would go for a digital mixer because it would give me more control over each channel, mainly more EQ options on each channel, the FX, and the master out.

I needed something with USB support, and to be able to hook up a few instruments at the same time. So I went with this one.

It supports 12 inputs, so I like to have one for each instrument/cable and set up the track so it's always the same. Has 4 mic inputs which would be handy, if I had more mics to use with it.

The built in effects are a nice addition. I don't have much use for them though, except for a bit of reverb on bass and vocals. Same with the auxiliary sends/receives but I have used them once or twice, they are handy when you've the need.

Hooking up via USB is the easiest way for me to record. Only problem is it only supports 2 lines at a time, meaning you can only record, say, a guitar by Mic and DI, or vocals with a guitar and still have the different tracks separate in your software.

It's simple enough to figure out how to use if you've not much experience with mixing desks, just play around with everything and you'll soon get the hand of it.

The case on mine was a slight bit warped when I got it, nothing too drastic, it's just a little wobbly but you don't notice it that much. All the sliders and knobs work smoothly and the buttons work as they should.

I've recorded vocals, electric & acoustic guitar, bass, keyboards and some more and it was pretty much plug and play the whole time.

Overall a really handy mixing desk. Does what it should, and then some.

mixer

Bought it for homestudio, but it also works great for small venue gigs and practicing

major pros:

-usb connection, cable included

-features, lots of them, eq, compressor, buit-in FX, aux send/receiver, mute option, peak LEDs, etc.

-phantom power

-4 mic inputs

-schematic connections for different types of use on the quick paper guide, really handy


major cons:
- the power supply cable doesn't fit that well, it needs some sort of adjustment to switch on the mixer... really annoying (Still deciding if I'll return iit for that)

- hate the gain knobs, they could have used some similar to the eq ones, one can't really see in what position the gain knob is

- handling, for newbies it is rather hard... spent some time to be able to get a usb signal on my recording program

- it only includes a quick paper guide, one needs to get the complete PDF one online for more in-depth

- one can only record in one's software two separate tracks at a time




Summing it up good product for price/quality.


I've ordered so many stuff from thomann that now I'm completely broke, can't order more great stuff :(