British mixer manufacturer, Allen & Heath, will be unveiling an exciting new addition to its range at the forthcoming Pro Light & Sound show in Frankfurt.
Designed for a broad range of applications from small radio or internet broadcast studios, to hospital radio, university radio, community radio and larger studios with multiple rooms, the XB-14 is equipped with a wealth of features specifically for broadcasters, including Telco inputs for telephone callers, mic fader start sensing for external connection and internal automatic muting of the speaker outputs, stereo channel start/cue outputs for CD deck transport control, multiple headphone outputs, and an additional stereo bus (Mix B).
“We have been approached by many customers who are producing programme-based material for broadcast, who can’t find a mixer with the right functionality to suit their budget. There is a host of new media opportunities these days, such as podcasting, open access broadcast, internet broadcast, even YouTube, which people want to explore and the XB-14 is crammed with features to cater for a variety of these applications,” said designer, Mike Griffin.
The XB-14 has 4 mic/line channels, 4 stereo channels and 2 Telco telephone communication channels, with 3-band EQ on the mono channels and 2-band EQ on the Telco and stereo channels. The mono mic/line channels have fader start logic switching, enabling them to control external equipment or automatically mute the speaker outputs to prevent acoustic feedback in localised or self-operated applications. Individual channels can also be remotely muted via the 15-way D connector. The stereo channels have ‘start & cue’ logic outputs to connect to external equipment such as CD players. The Telco channels have a clean feed comms facility for easy communication between the presenter and the cued caller.
There is a single aux bus for external effects processing, recording or auditioning, and a separate ‘Mix B’ stereo bus for recording an independent mix to the main programme mix, or creating a clean feed source with selected channels. The XB-14 also has USB connectivity for interfacing with PC/MAC to access computer-based audio files and content management systems, whilst simultaneously outputting programme, aux or Mix B feeds in digital format.
Separate headphone monitor mixes can be created for operator, presenter or guests, so the engineer can check levels and cue sources while the presenter or guest can listen to a different source. The engineer/producer can also communicate to the studio using the ‘Talk’ feature, or off-air to telephone callers. There is a facility for remote control of channel mutes from the studio using the remote interface connectors, which is ideal for studio-situated “cough” mute switches.
The XB-14 will be available from April at a retail price of £824 +VAT.
This is a test account making a test post.