Soundcraft spirit 8 vs Allen&Heath GL2800

[wearashirt]

I'm planning on upgrading my current hybrid analog-DAW set-up, to the mixing consoles stated in the title above, as those are the ones available in my used market. Perhaps those more experienced with either consoles and can offer an opinion or advice?

Here are my own curious questions, based on differences between Soundcraft Spirit 8 (SCs8) and Allen&Heath GL2800 (AHGL):

1. Do analog mixing engineers depend on input meters? SCs8 has large input peak meters, AHGL only has tiny four-LED input meters. I can live without large input meters, but I fear I may miss something.

2. Do matrix sends matter in a mixing environment? AHGL has more of them as well as busses. Busses will definitely be useful for group compression or EQ such as drums, to be routed to new return mono channels.

3. EQ bands on SCs8 13khz, 550-13k, 80-1.9k, 60hz
AHGL 12khz, 500-15k, 35k-1k, 80hz
AHGL's middle swept frequencies surpass the low and hi shelves by range. Is this indication of quality components?

4. Does anyone know which mixer has an earlier release date?

There also seems to be two kinds of Soundcraft Spirit 8's that confuse me.. nevertheless, I'm referring to the one that has the SOUNDCRAFT print facing up and Spirit 8 facing forwards from the meter bridge.

Soundcraft spirit 8 https://www.soundcraft.com/en/product_d ... -guide-pdf

Allen&Heath GL2800 https://www.allen-heath.com/media/gl2800ug_ap6095_3.pdf

All responses will be much appreciated!

[James Perrett]

When buying a used mixer one of the major considerations is maintenance. I would much prefer to be maintaining the Allen and Heath with its one PCB per channel rather than the Spirit which uses large PCB's with multiple channels on them.

Personally I don't rely on the mixer's meters although a signal present light on each channel is useful. I would rather rely on the meters on the recorder or computer.

Matrix mixes are rarely used in the studio. The Allen and Heath has them because it is a live console.

Those eq specs aren't comprehensive enough to say which is best - all you can say is that there are no holes in the frequency coverage. Both companies know how to make decent eq.

Release date isn't important.

[resistorman]

James is right about maintenance. My advice is that you shouldn’t buy old equipment unless you are capable of repairing it (and hopefully like doing it) or have the money to pay someone to do it for you. Which might run into a fair bit of coin! That said, I’d go for the AH… always liked them.

[wearashirt]

When buying a used mixer one of the major considerations is maintenance. I would much prefer to be maintaining the Allen and Heath with its one PCB per channel rather than the Spirit which uses large PCB's with multiple channels on them.

Thank you for the response James.

In this video, it's shown that the spirit 8 has individuated boards per channel. My current 1990 Soundcraft Spirit Live 16ch. is also the same. When I was at the tech shop, I saw other mixers (e.g. Yamaha MG) that had the single or 2-3 piece boards that you may be referring to. Am I understanding this difference correctly?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFrEhAA4zlo&t=246s

[Mike Stranks]

I've used and owned about 10-15 desks/boards from both Soundcraft and A&H and still have a small A&H.

Choose between them? A&H every time...

[James Lehmann]

I'm planning on upgrading my current hybrid analog-DAW set-up
1. Do analog mixing engineers depend on input meters? SCs8 has large input peak meters, AHGL only has tiny four-LED input meters. I can live without large input meters, but I fear I may miss something.

I mix hybrid on a Soundcraft Delta DLX which like a lot of mid-range consoles doesn't have individual channel input meters.

The short answer is no, I don't 'depend on input meters' when mixing. (Tracking might be a different story.)

As long as you've gain-staged everything correctly so you know exactly when and why the analog Peak LED is firing you're probably fine. In the case of my DLX: "Peak indicator LEDs fire at 7dB below clipping, i.e. when +14dBu is present within the input module."

Even then you could in theory work entirely by ear. The DLX is insanely clean and quiet, and has headroom that goes on for days so my DAW output levels are often calibrated to peak 2dB into the red with no adverse effect on the mix bus - I struggle to crunch/punch things up in a useful way things even with crazy input levels. But on a lot of desks it's much easier to hear when a channel is distorting and/or your mix bus is folding in on itself and giving up the ghost.

Of course, a proper 32-channel meter bridge looks as cool as fark...

I agree with the previous posters that getting into the analog mixer game is always a bit of a crapshoot. And in the £500 - £1,500 price range you are essentially going to be choosing between two options: EITHER a newer, mass-produced, non-modular board OR an older, modular board. There are pros and cons to both. After mixing for years first on a Mackie SR-24 and then an A&H ZED-428 I'm now in the latter camp with my Soundcraft DLX. So far so good, but of course I'm crossing my fingers as I say that; the hope being that if a channel or a group or a power supply go down I can continue working without having to send the entire board off for repair, which I had to do with the A&H when it developed a power supply fault. But there are simply no firm guarantees in this game in the same way an ITB mixer can probably easily transfer files to another computer and continue working.

[Hugh Robjohns]

1. Do analog mixing engineers depend on input meters?

Metering is always useful, but in this case you seem to be talking about using the console to mix signals from a DAW. In that case (a) you have meters on the DAW anyway and (b) you will already have setup the appropriate gain structuring when you installed the desk, and controlled signal levels during your DAW pre-production work. So there should be no level surprises and thus meters would be largely redundant. LED signal present indicators should suffice.

2. Do matrix sends matter in a mixing environment?

No, and they would have very limited use in your situation. Matrix sends are normally submixes of the groups and main outputs, intended to feed separate speaker arrays or stage monitoring. Not much use in a mixdown situation.

AHGL's middle swept frequencies surpass the low and hi shelves by range. Is this indication of quality components?

No. Just of design decisions. Both EQs have good ranges and are perfectly servicable.

4. Does anyone know which mixer has an earlier release date?

Not a clue... and you can google research that as easily as I can.

In general, assuming the consoles are in similar good condition, I'd lean towards the A&H design based on experience of use over the years, but they are both decent consoles.

[James Perrett]

In this video, it's shown that the spirit 8 has individuated boards per channel. My current 1990 Soundcraft Spirit Live 16ch. is also the same. When I was at the tech shop, I saw other mixers (e.g. Yamaha MG) that had the single or 2-3 piece boards that you may be referring to. Am I understanding this difference correctly?

I could well be wrong - Soundcraft brought out the Spirit range after they bought Seck so I assumed that the Spirits would be constructed in a similar way to the Seck consoles (and most modern affordable consoles with the exception of A&H).

[wearashirt]

I could well be wrong - Soundcraft brought out the Spirit range after they bought Seck so I assumed that the Spirits would be constructed in a similar way to the Seck consoles (and most modern affordable consoles with the exception of A&H).

Interesting. So the Spirit line didn't originally belong to Soundcraft? What company was Spirit made under?

[Arpangel]

Didn’t Harman take over Soundcraft some time ago?
I’ve used A&H, and mainly the older Soundcraft desks, now, I’d definitely go for A&H, the build of the newer Soundcraft desks isn’t good IMO.

[James Perrett]

Interesting. So the Spirit line didn't originally belong to Soundcraft? What company was Spirit made under?

The Spirits were always Soundcraft's budget range - they weren't sold by any other company. There's a brief version of the story at

http://www.gbaudio.co.uk/data/seck.htm

but I can't actually find a more detailed version of the story at the moment.

As Arpangel says, Soundcraft are now owned by Harman. As far as I know they still make some of their desks at Borehamwood in the UK alongside Harman's other console brand, Studer but the budget ranges are probably made in China.