At the 129th AES Convention Great River Electronics showcased their newest addition to the product line, the MixMaster 20.
The MixMaster 20 is an analog centerpiece for DAW based recording systems; tracking, editing, and mixing are all enhanced.
The MixMaster 20 includes four transformer coupled high gain low noise microphone preamplifiers that work with any type of microphone, ribbon, dynamic or condenser. Polarity and phantom power switching is provided on the front panel.
Line and instrument duties are handled by transformer coupled input bridging amplifiers with wide gain ranges, suitable for anything from keyboards to tape machines.
Each of the four input channels has a balanced insert point as well as four auxiliary output mix sends. Each channel may also be fed to the main stereo mix bus.
Mixing duties are handled by the four input channels plus the 16 transformer-less line input channels. Each of these channels has fully controllable level and pan settings to the stereo mix bus.
Mix settings can be stored and recalled via the USB port and a GUI compatible with most digital recording programs is in development to make the MixMaster 20 an automated analog mixer.
The mixing is done passively, with the summing gain provided by transformer coupled mixing amplifiers. The balanced output of this stage is available as a patch point for the insertion of compressors, equalizers or other signal processing equipment.
The return is also transformer balanced and feeds the Penny & Giles stereo fader and output line amplifier, also transformer coupled.
Control room monitoring functions are also provided. These include a versatile solo system, multiple speaker system selector and level control, mix replay monitoring and talkback. Talkback feeds the cut outputs and dims the main monitoring system to aid communications and minimize feedback.
