I'm a game streamer and let's player, which means i'm nothing short of obsessed with my audio, but also that my budget and knowledge are nothing like a sound engineer's. I don't need a mixer that takes up a whole room, but i'm not satisfied with toy-like entry mixers either.
It took a lot of searching and asking around, but i finally found and bought what has now become the favorite piece of audio gear in my room:
That's an Allen & Heath Zed-14 analogue mixer. I spent ~400$ on it and it has covered almost my every audio need (if the word "almost" makes you anxious, scroll down to my "Cons"). Read on to find out why, or scroll all the way down for my TL;DR if you're in a hurry.
Here are my totally subjective Pros and Cons from spending one month with it.
First, the good stuff:
👍 USB
Personally i don't know why there's still mixers without it. Having one is not enough though, i also want to be in full control of it and this mixer delivers by granting it a full channel strip of controls. It has it's own gain, equalization, fader, aux sends.. the whole lot! Speaking of which:
👍 4 Aux Sends
Major buying criteria for me right there - 2 pre fader and 2 post fader aux sends on each channel. Budget mixers usually offer 1-2 aux sends per channel (and all too often none on usb channels!), but if you have anything advanced in mind you'll need more. My case for example: I need to send my computer's stereo audio (that's 2 aux sends already) and my microphone's audio (that's another aux send) to a compressor unit, then route the stereo audio back into the mixer in an empty channel. By the way this is how i automatically lower the computer audio whenever i speak into my microphone (often refered to as sidechain compression or auto-ducking) and i'll write a separate article on how to do that at some point.
👍 Solid build quality
This thing is built like a tank and if you don't believe me just watch this overly excited sales person punch the *** out of it, just to prove the point. Alone the fact that each channel strip is an individual circuit board speaks volumes to it's durability. I for one feel safer knowing that if a channel strip ever dies it won't take the whole unit with it.
👍 HUGE faders
I was certain this wouldn't make much of a difference to me. Heck, i was almost ready to go for a mixer with rotary pots instead of faders and thank the heavens i didn't. It's such a pleasure operating faders, especially large ones! Example: Yesterday i was finishing the playthrough of a game and the credits started rolling with some cool music in the background. "Thanks for watching everybody! I'll just let you enjoy the rest of this song now", i said. Then slowly & smoothly pushed the mic fader down and the pc audio (music) fader up at the same time.. So satisfying (not to mention professional-sounding)!
👍 Stereo
This unit makes a real effort to be as stereo-friendly as possible. For starters there's a rotary pot for panning on every channel, but that's common. What impressed me was that two aux sends can be designated as left & right stereo channels and also the main mix fader is actually two separate faders for left and right. For one this made it easy for me to send out my computers stereo sound to a compressor. A few nights ago though, there was i weird problem with my pc audio: My computer's right channel was noticably a few dB's quieter than the left channel. It might have been the particular game i was playing, or my external compressor unit malfunctioning, or a cable not making full contact, who knows! I was streaming at the time and all i cared for was a quick fix, so i simply pushed the left main fader a little down and the right fader a little up and I was back in business.
👍 All-front audio connections
What i mean is that all of my audio devices plug in on the top part of the mixer, not on its back side. Very convenient for quickly switching microphones, inspecting routing issues etc without having to even stand up from my chair.
👍 It's beautiful!
This is a legitimate pro people! If you're reading this, then you're probably looking for a budget mixer, and if you're looking for a budget mixer, you're probably an artist and sound engineer all rolled into one. Now, the sound engineer in you probably wouldn't mind working on a boring monochrome mixer, but i bet the artist in you will appreciate the effect all the colours and lights of the Zed series on your creativity!
👍 Various Stuff
There's a lot of positives i haven't gone into detail, so the least i can do is try and cram them here just in case:
- 6 mono channels with insert jacks, 69dB's of gain, 12dB low-cut buttons and a 3-band EQ with 15dB boost/cut and sweepable mids.
- 4 stereo channels with RCA phono and regular L-R jacks, that are actually 8 stereo channels, since they have independent gain and will be summed into one L-R channel.
- The usb port can not only send the main mix (post fader) back to your computer, but alternatively the main mix pre-fader, aux 1+2 or aux 3+4. connections.
- 1/4" and 1/8" headphone input jacks.
It's not all roses though. Here are my cons:
👎 Sound leaks
It's not very noticeable, but when you mute everything and expect complete silence in your headphones, you can still very faintly hear your audio sources. I haven't tested this out very thoroughly to see if / how much it transfers onto the actual final recordings (because i never ever have complete silence when gaming anyway), so if you want me to test anything specific out just write me a comment.
👎 Old tech
That's not a con per se, but the idea of buying tech from the previous decade might not be your thing. Take it from me though, while digital is cool and versatile, it's ultimately unreliable. My personal audio setup started out all digital and i slowly reverted back to analogue, because i was spending too much time troubleshooting and my creativity suffered.
⏰ TL;DR: All in all this is a beautiful, old, reliable, durable and versitile mixer that will satisfy small-to-medium bands and streamers / let's players alike. All that can be had for ~400$ right now, so if you're in the market for a good budget mixer, take a serious look at the Allen & Heath Zed series of mixers.
Looks like you're going to be busy with you new toy, which looks great. I know nothing about music mixing, although I love EDM. Always admiring those who know how to handle these things in order to create good music. Nice review and love the photos as well.
Thank you Erikah!
My pleasure.
Its always with fun and happiness when we get the very things we long for. Such a lovely mixer you have in there and i know you will do more with it. Ecah second spent on your review made me fall for the device which is not mine...lol
The ride with you on your blog was indeed a great on. Good work and i wait to see some amazing stuffs you are going to do with te mixer soon.
Thanks! Yes, it's especially nice because it's the first mixer that i can really see holding on to for a long time. And hey, i hope you fall soon for something you can hold on to as well!
Hehe...yea i will hold plenty of them soon. And you are humbly welcome by the way
Have you tried testing your USB/XLR cables for balancing issues? Maybe there's a signal leaking from somewhere into your cables, either way, you sound very excited about your new equipment and it looks really good, the design and engineering of this device really stand out, you sell it really well, I'm glad you found it and enjoying it! Thanks for sharing!
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Thanks for your time and for creating great content.
Franz (@curie curator)
Thanks! I'm indeed very excited about the mixer, mainly because i was looking for a way to auto-duck pc audio and after trying a couple other things the past few years (software, digital mixers etc) i finally decided to do it the proper -but complex- analogue way and i couldn't be happier with the result! (btw I'm also preparing a series of articles on the different ways to achieve this auto-ducking effect). As for the leaks I haven't checked for balancing issues tbo, but i've been careful to only use balanced cables or very short 1m (3,3ft) unbalanced ones.
PS. Since you asked for it, a little about me / this article:
It's actually a weird little story how i got into audio equipment: I've always played a lot of video games, but due to family / job obligations i very rarely got to actually finish them, meaning i also didn't get to enjoy them fully. So i got into the habit of recording my gameplay and posting it online, hoping this would motivate me to finish the games i started. It most certainly worked and i was enjoying games much more this way, but there was also a pleasant side effect to this: Creating videos and interacting with people slowly motivated me to get into all sorts of creative things, like photo editing, writing articles and commenting my gameplay. I was kind of expecting this to be just a phase for me, but instead i kept getting more and more into it! I've upgraded my pc, my audio equipment and my software so many times that i'm starting to lose count, but it has been my main hobby for years now and i love it!
Hi shakmgaming,
Visit curiesteem.com or join the Curie Discord community to learn more.
Much appreciated!
That music thing, hahaha...we poor souls only know how to enjoy the music. We dont think about the nitty gritty of how a good music gives its birth, but heard that for a real musician it is like the pain of a child birth.
Technology had grown and it made life easier for all in general, and same may be applicable to musician too, is it? Earlier,. may be one or two decades back we know there are number of instruments required for composing and recording like 5 to 10 drums, violins etc...then what it was replaced by Rhythm box. I think so..
This is good read, shedding light to atleast one of the music stuff which never bothered to take the pain to know how it works.
Thank you
Glad you like it! Funny thing though how for all the good "digital" has brought, i still end up buying a decade old analogue mixer :)
Wow, i don't know about specifications of a mixer, but they really look cool when I see dj in club and music festivals , swinging their fingers in a cool manner, changing the beat and making the crowd jump. All I am thinking right now is you are of those cool guys :P :):) I really liked reading this piece because it is unique for me, I never knew this device is so much detailed. Congrats on your curie :) , well deserved :)
Thanks! Lol, yeah, mixers for sure can make someone look cool :)