Euphonix gave a phased release of their Artist Series Mix & Control Units.

The MC Mix is available in the UK now for £699 & was reviewed by Paul WHITE in this month's SOS. The video for the MC Mix has been available for a month or so now on the Euphonix web-site.

It now appears they have recently released the "video tour" for the MC Control (the MC Mix's Big Brother)...

In case anyone was wondering what extra features this has to offer, most of it is shown on this video. EUPHONIX MC CONTROL

Apparently it's going to be priced at £999 in the UK and is due for UK release soon...

So I thought I'd ask some questions to see if this is worthy of debate...

Is it worth the extra £300 over it's baby brother..? Is this unit really going to be all it's cracked up to be....? Does it claim to do more than it's cousin, the Mackie Control Universal...?

Is it budgeted correctly for this market...? Is there only so much you can do with a control surface or will the MC Control raise the bar significantly...?

Does this really matter or should I think about something infinitely more important like 'Why do they call orange jam "marmalade"...???'

Over to you...

worth the money? yeah - i reckon its cheap. And the fact that you have a modular system...cool. I'm getting one with 4 fader packs. Awesome stuff.

and , on top of Narco's reply, which i entirely agree with....

I'd add that Marmalade is so called because it was what Mary queen of scots used to have when she was ill.... having always been given oranges when she was ill as a child she formed the belief that anything made from oranges would do as a substitute when fresh oranges weren't available... so , the staff running round shouting "madame est malade" is what it's contracted from.

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if you don't know who i am, i aint gonna tell you.

Whereas 'Euphonix' comes from the merger of a Euphonium manufacturer and a particularly persuasive dominatrix.



Stephen

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New Henry Fool album (Featuring Phil Manzenera and Jarrod Gosling) out now. https://www.burningshed.com/store/henryfool/

Max,

You are indeed the oracle... Can you help with:

Can fat people go skinny dipping? and

What if the Hokey Cokey IS what its all about...?

1) yes
2) we're all doomed!, doomed I tell ye...



seriously though, the MC control touch screen implementation, and application switching tricks have the potential to make it the most flexible and personally task orientated control surface out there...

and the eucon ethernet protocol is also massively faster than Midi... the immediacy of response is quite noticeable compared to using older devices over midi.

and of course, entirely irrelevantly, it's gorgeous, and it doesn't look like it ought to be a behringer product.... unlike the new Mackie Control Pro series... I wonder if mackie did that on purpose?? would that be the ultimate product "rip off" irony???

there's lots of other stuff as well.... but I ought to let you guys discover something for yourselves... it's hard work being an oracle you know.... , and I still have to make my own tea sometimes as well !



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if you don't know who i am, i aint gonna tell you.

Quote Stephen Bennett:

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Whereas 'Euphonix' comes from the merger of a Euphonium manufacturer and a particularly persuasive dominatrix.



Stephen

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Don't jest - doing what I do you might actually get what you wish for

Quote Max!:

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and of course, entirely irrelevantly, it's gorgeous, and it doesn't look like it ought to be a behringer product.... unlike the new Mackie Control Pro series... I wonder if mackie did that on purpose?? would that be the ultimate product "rip off" irony???

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Lol - yeah I really don't like the new ones, horrible...

Quote desmond:

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Quote Max!:

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and of course, entirely irrelevantly, it's gorgeous, and it doesn't look like it ought to be a behringer product.... unlike the new Mackie Control Pro series... I wonder if mackie did that on purpose?? would that be the ultimate product "rip off" irony???

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Lol - yeah I really don't like the new ones, horrible...

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Or the old ones - they peaked with the HUI - which was brilliant for its time!

Should be interesting to see if anything similar comes out at a lower price point from the competition. Fingers crossed anyway!

bear in mind that BOTH MC control and mix are cheaper than the mackie when it first came out as the control universal (as opposed to the Logic control...) mackie hiked the RRP price by about £300 when they made it "universal" , from £799 ish for the logic control, to something like £1079

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if you don't know who i am, i aint gonna tell you.

no
its a toy like all the others!!!
get this




necro

Quote necromunger:

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no
its a toy like all the others!!!
get this


necro

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It does all of the necessary stuff that the daddy surface does. Most of thoe facilities are not needed by music makers - it much more fits in wirh music for media. The bigger Euphy system is actually a bit pants on its own - i've used one a few times with fader packs and it's brilliant - but without the faders it seems a lot of money for what it is.

Note that you can do application switching with soft-takeover in the exact same way as shown using an MCU + LC Xmu, so if you have Live & Logic running on the same computer, switching between them will instantly update the MCU with the top applications control surface...

As for the multi-machine controlling, that's more useful for production facilities I guess, and not that useful for the average (well, considering the price of the big consolse, *above-average*) home studio...

I do hope that buttons/keys with integrated displays filters down the technology chain to become affordable one day - it would be nice to have context-sensitive keyboards which change labelling according the application...

Necro

Thanks for the You Tube stuff. It helps explain the Artist Series' position in the market place a bit better to me...

Like Narco says, the MC Control appears to focus on these main functions shown in the You Tube videos.

If this is the genetics of the MC Control, it bodes well for the Project Studio & Semi-Pro (if not full Pro) user in my opinion...

It's expandable, has a very flexible feature set which suggests that you can make it work the way YOU want it to work & (agreeing with Max...) it looks the business as well. The ethernet feature seems to be the biggest plus point to me, effectively gazumping midi in one bold step... Paul WHITE's review of the MC Mix seemed to suggest that the ethernet system was not noticeably processor-hungry... Doesn't seem to take up much in the way of "desk real estate" either...

Am I right in thinking this is Mac only...? The MC Pro doesn't seem to mind which platform it works with, according to the You Tube stuff, but I think I may have read somewhere that the MC Control is particular to the mac at the minute...???

They also need to get the new style Apple keyboards on the MC, it's much lower profile and won't look nearly so ugly...

Yeah, its mac only. Bummer for a large portion of the world. Although in a perfect place I guess every computer would be as fine as a mac.

Liz

Quote EnlightenedHand:

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Yeah, its mac only. Bummer for a large portion of the world. Although in a perfect place I guess every computer would be as fine as a mac.

Liz

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I think you'll find the PC version will be shipping at around the same time as the MC Control launches.

Narco - stop pointing out how damn good the CM408T fader banks are, I've run out of wifey's spare stockings after robbing the last bank for the MC Pro.

Oh, and you can put any keyboard on the MC Pro - I helped a colleague install his last week complete with the new low profile nasty horrid Mac keyboard thing.

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Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.

Quote redleicester:

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Oh, and you can put any keyboard on the MC Pro - I helped a colleague install his last week complete with the new low profile nasty horrid Mac keyboard thing.

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It's actually grown on me, and I really like it now... it's especially good as it's much quieter to operate the keys than the old Apple keyboards...

Quote redleicester:

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I think you'll find the PC version will be shipping at around the same time as the MC Control launches.

Narco - stop pointing out how damn good the CM408T fader banks are, I've run out of wifey's spare stockings after robbing the last bank for the MC Pro.

Oh, and you can put any keyboard on the MC Pro - I helped a colleague install his last week complete with the new low profile nasty horrid Mac keyboard thing.

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So do you know for sure if Euphonix is indeed planning to manufacture a PC version? I've been wondering because I use a PC and I haven't been able to find any official word from Euphonix about PC compatibility and the artist series controllers, (aside from the current info about them being non-compatible).

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MIRRORMIX STUDIO
blog

Quote redleicester:

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Quote EnlightenedHand:

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Yeah, its mac only. Bummer for a large portion of the world. Although in a perfect place I guess every computer would be as fine as a mac.

Liz

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I think you'll find the PC version will be shipping at around the same time as the MC Control launches.

Narco - stop pointing out how damn good the CM408T fader banks are, I've run out of wifey's spare stockings after robbing the last bank for the MC Pro.

Oh, and you can put any keyboard on the MC Pro - I helped a colleague install his last week complete with the new low profile nasty horrid Mac keyboard thing.

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Ha! They're really good. I prefer it over the ICON although I'd probably go Logic or similar if I bought an MCPro for here. Mighty impressive with the faders - the screen feedback is incredible - you feel like you're using something similar to Duality!

Is it any good?

The main and perhaps most important thing is that it looks and feels fantastic and as such will encourage me use it more than I currently use my Mackie Control Pro.

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Stand by for action - we are about to launch Stingray!
Cue irritating bongo music ...

Quote Commander:

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Is it any good?

The main and perhaps most important thing is that it looks and feels fantastic and as such will encourage me use it more than I currently use my Mackie Control Pro.

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Drop me a call on the base hotline, and I'll go through it with you old bean.... lots to talk about.

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Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.

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Samplecraze
Stretch That Note

Ah Zuke.... erm....... was wondering when you'd turn up..... erm........ er....... ummm.....

MOVE ALONG!

NOTHING TO SEE HERE!

MOVE ALONG!





(PS, have you seen my MCP?)

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Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.

Having had my Mackie Control for about a week, I'm coming to the conclusion that having 8 faders isn't much better than having one, as I'm constantly paging through or selecting channels from Logic's mixer. Having said that, it is helping my 'sore arm syndrome' though!

I think what I'd really like is a unit with a single nice motorised fader and a lot of knobs (say about 20) each with a full- name LCD display of the parameters on the currently focused plug-in or soft synth - in the order they appear on the screen in Control mode. So it'd be 'click, Track select, adjust level and pan and so on, click plug-in to open or set focus and adjust.' Result.

That, along with pan knobs, solo, mute and automation controls would do me I think.


Stephen

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New Henry Fool album (Featuring Phil Manzenera and Jarrod Gosling) out now. https://www.burningshed.com/store/henryfool/

I also found that 8 faders was not enough, so I bought a Mackie XT Pro Extension. Now with 16 faders (actually 17) I am a lot happier. Being able to see 16 tracks at once and just grabbing a fader is really nice and fast.

I know you Mackie Controller users don't like the newer Pro version, but Paul brought out that the jog wheel is better, some improvements like full led lights for solo and mute's. Also it's tilted more forward for easier viewing and when you put a XT Pro next to the Pro model they sit closer to each other giving a feeling that they are one unit. I also like that the Mackie (compared to the Euphonix MC Mix) is a bigger unit giving more of a analog console feel to it.

In regards to the MC Control, I think it is a great unit! Being able to customize it to the way you want is great! However for the price of the MC Control, you could buy a Neumann U87ai, Brauner Panthera, Avalon 737, and several Wave bundles. I would think getting this type of gear would be more important to have first. If you then have this type of gear in your studio, then you would have to consider if you would want the MC Control.

I have only used the MC Control at the AES show last two times it was in New York. Though I think it's really great, I am so used to a work flow with at least 16 faders. I had 16 faders with my old Behringer DDX, and now with the Mackie Pro and XT controller. At this point, I am tempted to get another XT to have 24 faders. At the mix down stage, I like the analog feel of all the faders and just grabbing a pan or solo button on any channel without pushing buttons and working to get to the channel. Also the visual on looking at your faders and seeing the volume on each track is nice. I know you your faders on your DAW as well, but that is not a 3 dim view that you receive when looking at your controller.

Everyone has a different work flow, so what ever works best for you, is the way you should go. Even if the famous Hugh Robjohns likes to work in a different way than you.

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revelationsoundstudio.com

Quote Glenn Bucci:

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In regards to the MC Control, I think it is a great unit! Being able to customize it to the way you want is great! However for the price of the MC Control, you could buy a Neumann U87ai, Brauner Panthera, Avalon 737, and several Wave bundles. I would think getting this type of gear would be more important to have first. If you then have this type of gear in your studio, then you would have to consider if you would want the MC Control.

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Erm..... where on earth are you getting that Neumann, Brauner and so on so cheap?! The MC Control retails at £999 in the UK....???!!!!!! A Neumann U87ai alone is around £1600....

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Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.

In the MC Mix review, Paul notes:

"having the faders clatter to the bottom every time you switch from a DAW to a word processor is slightly irritating"

Hmmmm. I frequently switch from my DAW to Mail or Web Browser apps, often while the music is running. This would be unusably annoying

Paul suggests:

"Perhaps just leaving them where they are when switching to an unsupported application would be a kinder option, both to the user and the faders?"

which makes sense. Even better, might be an option to keep working even when another app is in the foreground on the mac. I can play my softsynths whilst browsing the web, so why can't I tweak my mix ??

Perhaps this would be incompatible with the "multi-DAW" operation. But I only use one DAW, so would be quite happy to disable multi-DAW operation in order to work in the background. Does that make (some) sense ?

Quote redleicester:

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[

Erm..... where on earth are you getting that Neumann, Brauner and so on so cheap?! The MC Control retails at £999 in the UK....???!!!!!! A Neumann U87ai alone is around £1600....

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Glenn is in the USA - it's probably $1600 there.....

That's about £8.20 at today's exchange rate.

Stephen

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New Henry Fool album (Featuring Phil Manzenera and Jarrod Gosling) out now. https://www.burningshed.com/store/henryfool/

Glenn's response also implies he doesn't realise you can add MC-Mixes to the MC control to have as many faders as he has now, or more/...

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if you don't know who i am, i aint gonna tell you.

Sorry I thought you were referring to the MC Pro . Yes I am aware that you can connect the Mc Mix and MC Control together. The MC Pro is the one that I was pretty impressed with but way too much money for a controller with only 4 faders.

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revelationsoundstudio.com

Or that he's confusing the MC Control (£999 inc VAT):




With the MC Pro (£8k+VAT):



(Which obviously we don't talk about or Zuke will start sobbing again! )


Certainly with the addition of 4x MC Mix's to an MC Control it'd give you.... erm.... lots of faders:

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Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.

Quote Glenn Bucci:

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Sorry I thought you were referring to the MC Pro . Yes I am aware that you can connect the Mc Mix and MC Control together. The MC Pro is the one that I was pretty impressed with but way too much money for a controller with only 4 faders.

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Easy - then you spec it with a pair of joysticks instead, and add the CM408T fader banks - up to a potential 127 of them, which would give you a whole lot of faders!




Musssssttttt resssissssstttt.....

PS - Zuke, can I suggest you just ignore all my posts from now on?

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Ars longa, vita brevis, occasio praeceps, experimentum periculosum, iudicium difficile.

I could only find one price for those fader packs - a snip at 15 grand for eight faders.... yikes!

Nice though!

Quote EnlightenedHand:

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Quote redleicester:

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I think you'll find the PC version will be shipping at around the same time as the MC Control launches.

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So do you know for sure if Euphonix is indeed planning to manufacture a PC version? I've been wondering because I use a PC and I haven't been able to find any official word from Euphonix about PC compatibility and the artist series controllers, (aside from the current info about them being non-compatible).

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I found on the Nuendo forum that several users got the following answer from Euphonix:
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Thank you so much for your interest in our newest Artist series products.

The PC/Windows compatible Artist series products are now in development. Please come back and visit our Website for release date.
Best regards,
The Euphonix support team
-------------------------------------------------

Some users reported rumors gathered at the Frankfurt Messe that it would be for the fall. If it's true, we PC users will have to be patient, or maybe some other manufacturers will come with something similar, PC-compatible, between now and then?

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dB Studio - recording, mixing, transfer
www.dBStudio-Liege.net

Quote Glenn Bucci:

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The MC Pro is the one that I was pretty impressed with but way too much money for a controller with only 4 faders.

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I fear you may have completely misunderstood the raison d'etre of the MC Pro, Glenn. The four faders are a useful facility to have, but the strength of the surface is the dynamic switches and controllers, and the way it integrates with the software of whatever application you are using. And for the applications it is intended for, it is priced very well, IMHO.

The MC Control shares a little of the technology, but is a completely different beast intended for completely different markets and applications

Hugh

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Technical Editor, Sound On Sound

Quote Hugh Robjohns:

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Quote Glenn Bucci:

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The MC Pro is the one that I was pretty impressed with but way too much money for a controller with only 4 faders.

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I fear you may have completely misunderstood the raison d'etre of the MC Pro, Glenn. The four faders are a useful facility to have, but the strength of the surface is the dynamic switches and controllers, and the way it integrates with the software of whatever application you are using. And for the applications it is intended for, it is priced very well, IMHO.

The MC Control shares a little of the technology, but is a completely different beast intended for completely different markets and applications

Hugh

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Hi Hugh,

I understand it, but for price of it ($15,000) I would rather have the hardware gear I stated above with a Mackie Controller and Expander. If I already had all the mic's (I want the Brauner Panthera) EQ's and pre's I wanted, and had $15,000 to spend on a controller, I would be tempted to get the MC Pro. As I said, I was pretty impressed with it. But since 1984, I have been working with 16-24 fader mixers and like having the multiple faders and scribble strips. Just the way I prefer working. I know the MC Pro has buttons in the middle that show you everything, and you can jump to a fader quickly with it too. Of course if I had $15,000 and spent it on the Mc Pro, I think my wife would leave me. My son will need braces in the next year, and she has many projects for us to do around the house. The Mc Pro is for ....a pro studio that does this every day with clients. Not the weekend engineer who records his own music and others when he has the free time.

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revelationsoundstudio.com

Quote Max!:

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I'd add that Marmalade is so called because it was what Mary queen of scots used to have when she was ill.... having always been given oranges when she was ill as a child she formed the belief that anything made from oranges would do as a substitute when fresh oranges weren't available... so , the staff running round shouting "madame est malade" is what it's contracted from.

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This, of course, is completely untrue. From the Oxford English dictionary:-

It first appeared in English in 1480, borrowed from French marmelade which, in turn, came from the Portuguese marmelada. Originally, according to the root of the word, which is marmelo, "quince", a preserve made from quinces.

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Samplecraze
Stretch That Note