(Editor’s note: I was fascinated when Lee Jacobson explained how he uses his 01V. Although I have seen them in many musician’s racks, at high-end productions like the Cirque du Soleil and the Neil Diamond band, I had never looked at the rear panel. I did not realize the flexibility of the “omni” outs, and how they can be auxes, or direct channel outs, or mirror the L/R outs. Lee makes a clear analysis of how using this console compares, in terms of cost and functions, to a traditional FOH drive and dynamics system. Lee also invested in the optional ability to have a 24 analog inputs. Quite a machine! - C.K.)

Yamaha 01V

Once upon a time, if you wanted a system capable of doing the average band in a bar, you would have to spend several thousand dollars. In addition, there would be piles of wires to hook up, and the resulting desk/racks would cover several square feet of space, and take up lots of room in the van.

Thankfully, those days are all but over. Today there are several small format digital mixers on the market. Most of these have built in effects, dynamics processing on at least several channels, and quite extensive EQ built in as well. Let’s take a look at the Yamaha 01v, as it falls right in the middle of the price and features range.

In order to provide reinforcement for the average bar band, one needs a minimum of channels, processing, and effects. For the purpose of comparison, assume a 16 channel mixer capable of four monitor mixes and two effect sends. The Allen and Heath MixWizard 16:2 is such a mixer. Typical club processing may include four channels of gates, and eight channels of compression as well as one digital delay and one reverb unit.

01V rear panel detail

For our comparison, we’ll assume our rack includes one Aphex 104 quad gate, and four dbx 166a compressors, to be patched where they are needed. For effects, a T.C. D-Two is a nice delay, and a Yamaha REV500 is a decent ‘verb. As for EQ, we’ll go with three dbx 1213s, a nice sounding, affordable unit.

Let us look at some direct comparisons.

Size: The analog rig takes up 17 rack spaces, plus the mixer, and is roughly 100 pounds or so. The 01v is roughly 18x22x5 inches, and 27 pounds.

Cost: The analog system includes $4500 worth of equipment by the time we get it all cabled up. At 16 channels, for $1800 the 01v is winning the race.

Flexibility: the 01v lets us put any type of dynamics on any of the standard16 channels. Unlike the analog rack, we don’t have 4 gates and 8 comps. We have 22 dynamics processors, to be used or not, on whatever we need to use them on. What about EQ? The analog mixer has four bands with swept mids. The 01v has four band fully parametric on 16 inputs, and 6 outputs.

The above translates into easier setups, less weight, repeatable performance, and fewer killed seats. All of these are very important, especially in the typical “menu-venue” where small-scale sound reinforcement is the order of the day.