I can see a market for an SSL product that’s more about sculpting what goes into the mixer, less about all the gazillion ways you can route external gear and monitoring it if fifty shades of Oxford.
The SiX is very relevant for what it does, it really is a swiss army knife for the producer who needs all this flexibility, but for a fellow like myself, who has like one or two fx boxes and monitors only occasionally outside my headphones, I’m paying a lot of money for slots I won’t be using.
On the other hand, in the rare events where I’ve gone, “Humm, I wonder if I could …”, the SiX always says, “Yes, you can.” It’s one of the few kits I’ve used that’s never left me stranded for what it sets out to do.
Like I’m running out of sends, then realised I haven’t tapped into the SiX’s B bus. But I’m like you in the way that I’ve become minimal (2 stereo synths, mono bass synth and AR). But throw in an Overdrive or two, and 2 reverbs, the Six is perfectly inexcessive .
One thing I’ve found odd is the alt input on one and two. The way you have to turn it on just seems odd and you can’t use it with the first stereo send. (I think I have that right, it’s not in front of me at the moment)
I run all my gear (OT/RT/A4/Guitar) into a Six. Monitors out of the Main Monitor on the Six. Main Mix goes into Focusrite Claret 4Pre for recording in Logic. Daw back out of Focusrite and into Six Ext Inputs.
If I ran my monitors out of the Focusrite instead of the Six, would I loose anything (quality) or introduce latency?
I’m thinking of changing the Focusrite to a SSL2 as I don’t use half of the inputs on the Focusrite and don’t like the mixer app. Also I think the SSL2 has direct-monitoring
I run the Six into an Apogee Duet, really nice AD conversion. so if you don’t need the all ins & outs a nice option to consider. They can be found reasonably cheap on the second hand market as well. I monitor from the Six though, Duet runs back into the EXT inputs.
So I couldn’t resist and picked up a SiX. It’s a beautiful piece of gear!
I’m a total moron when comes to all this so I’m hoping for some assistance with my plan or lack thereof.
Once my dedicated music room is done I plan on having two areas next to each other. One will be my desk with a Mac, MPC Live, DN, and SSL2+. The other Area will be for recording acoustic guitar and vocals. I will probably separate the two with something for isolation. The SiX is going to play a few roles in this setup and this is where I can’t get my head around it. Firstly, I need the SiX as a mixer for MPC and DN to record into the DAW. I’ll also need it for tracking guitar and vocals, which means I’ll need it in the proximity of the recording area for control. Lastly, I will want to sum through it for final production.
My guess is I’m looking at a lot of patching which is why I’m asking for options. My most important goal here was to have no thought needed to make music within a semi-static setup. If I whip up a nice acoustic riff, I want to be able to hit record without any configuration or setting up mics. That also applies to MPC/DN, have something cooking and capture it immediately. Not sure that’s going to work with my current equipment. I also picked up a patch bay thinking it may help. Any advice or thoughts would be appreciated.
Once I have this sorted, routing and cabling will be next.
Thanks
I read this entire thread a few times and must say thanks for all the wisdom everyone provided.
As far as inputs go, there are quite a bit, even though it is a small mixer. You can use track 1 and 2 for things like guitars and vocals, as it has preamps for mics, and can even act as a DI for things like bass, or electric guitars. And then use channels 3/4, 5/6, and the two sets of stereo Ext. inputs for things like your MPC, or the DN. The thing you might be limited here, is by your audio interface, as I believe it only has 2 ins and 2 outs. But, it all depends on how you are using it, and it may not be an issue at all for you.
If you are going to sum through the Six, that will probably take most of the inputs, depending on how many tracks/groups you are summing. So, I don’t know how you work, but it seems to me that it would be beneficial, to track at different sessions than you are summing. That way you can have sessions of creating, recording, and whatnot. And then, because summing is really a final step, just reconfigure the mixer for final mixing/summing sessions.
This video is pretty good. Gaz gives a review of the Six, and he has a lot going into and out of it, and does a good job explaining it all.
if you want to record through it AND sum through it, you absolutely have to re-patch it between those two processes. I’d likely leave it setup in “record mode” until it’s time to mix. if you jump frequently between the two though, that could get annoying. the patch bay will help though.
actually if it were me… I’d create an aggregate device with the SSL2+ and DN, and then track the DN and MPC through the DN. not sure you’re gaining much by tracking them through the SiX’s stereo channels, unless you patch them to the mono channels because you really want those pres and want to EQ/compress them while tracking… you likely DO want to do that with the acoustic and vocals though, and you’ll want to use the pres for those. so I would leave those two ready to go in the mono channels, then hard-wire the SSL2+'s four outputs to the two stereo channels of the SiX, SiX’s outputs to the stereo ins of the SSL2+, and boom there’s your recording and summing. no need to re-patch.
don’t need to. DN is class compliant. just plug it into your Mac and make an aggregate device. you’ll see it in Ableton/Logic/etc then. works on my 2009 iMac (where OB will never work), should work for you
you won’t get the ability to break out tracks and record those individually all at once, however. you’ll only get stereo out of it (two channels in your DAW). if you want to break all the tracks out and record that at once, you’ll need OB.
you may actually be able to get another two channels of output from your DAW, via the DN, then run that into the SiX. that way you can sum six channels instead of two. would be great to run vocals or guitar back through those pre/mono channel strips. I’m not 100% sure you can do this, but I’m pretty sure…
So those of you that have this mixer, how are you getting on with it these days? At first I gawked at the price and seemingly limited number of inputs, but I think using all the summing options plus a small patchbay it could be made to work.
Is there a major difference in sound quality versus typical Mackie/Soundcraft/A&H mixers? Are the comps useful for tracking into a DAW versus just using plugins later?
For me it’s become the control centre for everything I do. I normally don’t like the colour that mixers impart on the sound (except my BX-800 ) so avoid them all together when recording… but now everything I do goes through the six.
That’s what I wanted to hear! I have the SSL2+ so I feel I’m good for basic 2ch conversion, and having all the options of the SiX on the front end seems like the way to go.
The problem I am having with my mixes is that they have too much bass and insanely sharp highs.
Would you guys say that the Six’s 2-band EQ is enough for dialing in a mix that sounds “good enough”? Meaning minimal / no post processing needed in a daw and such.
My MacBook crashes when I open up SSL plug-ins, and that leads me to believe the Six would be a better option for recording / eq’ing into my SSL 2+.
Yes. I release commercial work recorded through the SiX straight into a Zoom and that’s the master. But I’m very careful with my source material. You can’t fix something that’s really off, but if it’s almost there or already decent, the SiX works magic into it. Especially if you sum all your stuff into it and spread it out. It provides so much space for your music to breathe.
) so avoid them all together when recording… but now everything I do goes through the six.