Behringer X32 Compact

Like other reviews say, leave all your previous hangups about Behringer at the door, they have really changed their game with the X32 line of products. The build quality is excellent: the dials, sliders and buttons seem very hard wearing. Once you get the whole feel about the flexible mix bus workflow this desk uses (and a lot of higher-end digital consoles use), it is an absolute joy to use.

The preamps are absolutely worlds apart from Behringer's previous offerings, big and bold sounding without going dull. They have a tendency to start to sound a little thin if you need to crank the gain, but I've been assured this is a typical quirk of Midas designed preamps. Digital scribble-strips at this price point is just plain unheard of!

Bought this with two S16 digital snake modules, effectively doubling the analogue I/O. I silly cannot believe that this system was purchased for relatively little money and the quality is retained. Fantastic. If Behringer can shake off their historical 'cheap&nasty' stigma, this will be the product line that completely obliterates the competition at this price range, although it's doing a pretty good job already.

Oh, and be very careful with the latched XLR inputs on the X32 and S16s. There have been reports of XLR connectors (with the little latch 'window') getting stuck in there. I have had other equipment suffer this issue and I have avoided this by using Switchcraft or Neutrik XX series XLR connectors (or ones without the 'window').

Use: I am currently using or have used the Behringer X32 in my Home studio, for my band practice and gigs. I have also used it for some very high end Club concerts.

Clarity: The signal quality of the preamps is very clean and transparent. There is no signal disturbance on recordings. The vocals and instruments sound exactly the way they are which is very important while track recording. There is no colour to the sound, when one compares it to the Midas M32 which has a fatter/thicker sound.

Pros: 1. Very portable. Can be easily carries in a soft case in the car.
2. The software is very easy to use and understand. The firmware updates kept improving. Right now I can say that X32 offers software capabilities like some higher end digital mixing desks.
3. The Behringer line of products offers some excellent hardware integration peripherals with the X32 to customise your audio network with other hardware devices.
4. The screen size is very good for navigation.
5. The price point is very good compared to other digital mixers.

Cons: Nothing to complain so far...:)

Comprehensibility:1. Very good desk for beginners as it is easy to use and understand.
2. Very useful in studio environments as you can get good visual feedback from the desk.
2.

Firstly Don't be out off this product because of previous opinions and biases about Behringer this is a completely new ball game. As soon as I unpacked and saw it I thought wow !!! this is different, it ouses quality and sophistication.There is no in depth manual available yet but frankly I got it going without even looking at the instructions, to go through all it's features would be beyond a simple review but I particularly liked the effects section which really does have eight full effects racks that are divided into 4 send and return types and 4 insert types. On the down side and I suspect this is because I do a lot of very simple shows with simple setups you can only control the first eight inputs with the first eight sliders so if you want to control input nine you have to start layer hopping. For me the most basic of all basic setups would be sixteen inputs controlled by sixteen sliders and I can't understand why it can't do this (although Joe Sanborn of Behringer has said he will ask if there can be a firmware update to change it) I'm sending mine back for this reason alone, everything else is fantastic. I suspect that sound engineers who have worked on digital desks a lot will have no problem with this but to me potentially having to control forty inputs with eight faders and having to hop through nine layers to do it is too much.
----> The firmware has been updated and you can now use all 16 faders as input if you so choose.

I first posted this quick review mistakenly in the X32 Compact Case section (which I have to add is a very good case having purchased one).

FOH for a local band, I was pointed toward this desk by another FOH sound guy who mixes named bands for a living and told to ignore the Behringer name. How right he was, 15 months down the line with one and no complaints. Loads of FX and EQ's built in, knobs feel responsive and precise and the 7 inch screen is easy to read when on individual page. You can save and swap scene setups quickly. I save the settings from every place the band plays so that next time we play there I can reload and have a base setup to quickly work with. It can be a bit of a tricky learning curve at first, remembering where every layer and settings lurk, but you can set custom buttons to quickly go to the things you use most during a show (these are also saved within the scenes). Overall you cannot get better for the price.
I was a Allen & Heath diehard (still have one as backup), but I now can set up in 1/4 of the time (usually less) ready for sound check. Thank you Behringer / Midas.

I have been incredibly surprised by this unit, like many others I have had my fair share of Behringer kit that broke just out of warranty and was always in the category of "ok for the money". The overall sound quality of this unit is really very good indeed. I have the latest firmware installed and the quality of the hall and plate reverbs is very good. The graphic EQs are also very smooth and do not seem to cause the degradation in phase response that some other low end digital mixers do.

The channel and bus dynamics are also notably better than the ones I have used on other entry level digital desks, even above this price point. The inclusion of variable hold as well as attack and release is extremely useful, especially on the gate where it can greatly reduce chatter when the threshold and background noise level are close together.

With the X32 range Behringer has moved from "ok for the money" to "excellent for the money". There are better desks out there but nothing even remotely close in overall price/features/performance.

Coming from an analogue panel, it's a pleasure to work with. Many features, nice automated faders, scribble strip and much much more. Nearly everything is positive.

Some small disappointments found (yet):
- multiple headphone jacks - good, but made inside the handles so we had to get the jack converters out with pliers (could be only us though)
- built-in usb recorder records in 1536kbps files, which is so much more than we need, and it slows down the file transfer time to storage media. Cannot change this as far as I know.
- fader knobs sometimes wiggle out of position, but are easy to push back.

Note that these comments should not be the factor to not buy this mixer! We don't have any regrets on buying this and are using it happily in our church.