It seems to me that lots of people are keen to knock Behringer products but most seem to own a piece of there kit. I for one have a couple of pieces like autocom, DI box and a graphic Eq, I certainly would not say they are my goto choices but when needs arise they are available and used, apart from the DI box which i find unusable due to high noise levels.
So hands up if you have a piece of their kit lurking around your studio

I don't have any gripes with Behringer, you get what you pay for imo

Some of it is junk and some of it is actually pretty good value for money

I use the EM-600 delay guitar pedal quite a lot, for the price I can't complain.

I did also have the CC-300 which is meant to be based on the Boss Dimension C (DC2) and it was utter crap

Edited by vinyl_junkie (18/07/12 10:53 PM)

Pretty sure I've got a volume pedal somewhere.

Hope that helps.

One has to hide ones behringers. It's the shame that's hard to live with.

I use a graphic EQ on my PA system. Does the job, sounds good and has never let me down.

I own a Xenyx 502 mixer. It's pants.

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Composer;
www.ogonline.org

Used to, but ditched it all due to multiple failures.................

Bob

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www.bickerton.co.nz

Quote Bob Bickerton:

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Used to, but ditched it all due to multiple failures.................

Bob

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+1.



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Mixing Secrets for the Small Studio
A complete mixing method based around the techniques of the world's most famous producers.

Quote Mike Senior:

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Quote Bob Bickerton:

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Used to, but ditched it all due to multiple failures.................

Bob

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+1.

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+2

+3

The trouble is, it's a craps-shoot whether you get something worth having and will actually work for longer than a few months. Having had a mixer go up in flames, EQs that are phase problems in a box and headphone amps that weaker than the average proper line-driver, plus having opened and seen what is actually inside their other boxes, I just stay totally clear of their rubbish.

You can get far, far better stuff from companies like Phonic and many others that actually work and only cost marginally more, so there just is no reason to buy heavily marketed junk that is unlikely to work properly from Behringer.

I have had five small mixers from Phonic that cost about £35 each that are one eight hours a day, five days a week. We keep them as personal mixers for foldback and they have so far have never ever had one single fault - and we have had them for nearly ten years!!!

There's snobbery both ways. Some people don't have many good things to say about Behringer just because they are believers in the 'reassuringly expensive'. Some simply want to appear to be 'cool' on internet fora! There's also a reverse snobbery with some people who seem to feel that any criticism of Behringer must be fought and defended. Of course, it's all nonsense.

Let's face it, a lot of B gear is cheap because it's built down to a price. You get what you pay for, in other words. If you're happy to accept a lower build standard for the sake of just being able to get going, then no problem, but don't be blinkered into believing that cheap always equates with good. Some days I don't want to eat McDonalds.

Some B gear is great for the money. Some does an 'OK job' for a knock-down price. Some of it is just pants. I'd include some of their DI boxes very much in the latter category - not only unreliable, but appallingly noisy and tinny when it *is* working. Some of it is also derivative, arguably to the point of plagiarism, and I would not be comfortable giving my money away for such gear - I voluntarily paid more for my cable tester, for instance.

But I do own and use some of their stuff and I have no problem with this. I'm no snob either way. If a piece of their gear works to an acceptable standard, then I'll use it, but if it doesn't meet my requirements then I'll pass and buy something else that does.

I've had two ADA-8000s fail too early in their lifespan, and one studio owner I know went through several of their headphone amps in an alarmingly short timespan before ditching them for another brand. That many of us are aware of that kind of track record makes us realistic about what we get with Behringer - it may be cheap, but it's not always cheerful, and when your living depends on your gear you need to be able to rely on it to an acceptable standard day after day.

Behringer aren't a cause or a religion that need to be defended, or championed. They simply make gear that should be viewed for what it is, and either does what you want, or doesn't.

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An Eagle for an Emperor, A Kestrel for a Knave.

I have an early Composer which has a usable noise gate, but the compressor isn't much to write about. But it still works after about 14 years, although the left LEDs have failed a bit.

I also have a Eurorack mixer which has useless EQ and a constant hum, so has been unplugged and propped against the wall for a while.

The only piece I use is a DI box, for my Rhodes and clavinet, it does a job, but I have nothing to compare the quality of it against.

I don't mind some budget kit in my studio, I have a little Samson mixer to accomodate some inputs and it is quiet and compact.

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http://soundcloud.com/richie-royale
http://www.mixcrate.com/richieroyale

Absolutely nothing wrong with Behringer gear and I wish people would stop knocking them. Hell, they make the best doorstops I've ever come across after Samson Servos and the C1000.

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Samplecraze
Stretch That Note

Friend of mine had a cheap nasty Behringer mixer, all I can say is I've had more problems with my 32ch over priced Mackie board than he has ever had with his cheap door stop

I feel as if the crapnes adds to my "tone" now though hahahah

I used to have some, until they broke!

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Neil Haynes - The Parlour Recording Studio
The Parlour FaceBook Page

I sell medical equipment for a living. When a customer wants to buy a system from me they have a choice between mine and competing products. When I try to discover their needs, the most important factor to come out fron the customer will ALWAYS be some feature or other and of course price.... When you are buying something, you are already imagining how great it is going to be when you have all those new features and your life gets better. Being a dour old sod, I gently point out that the most important feature of any piece of equipment is that you press the 'on' button and it works.

The thing is, features and performance are really subjective. One persons great sound quality is another persons harsh. Reliability is far less subjective. In the case of 'it doesn't work at all' or 'it caught on fire' then it isn't very subjective at all!!

Behringer have earned a reputation for being the company whose 'on button' doesn't always work. I have no personal experience of them and I would not slag them off based on what I don't personally know but the depth of feeling out there based on binary user experience (it works vs it doesn't work) is huge. For this reason I think it is reasonable for an individual to write them off based on other folks experience. Of course, YMMV but that's the way I feel because of how I feel about reliability.

I do no have brand blinkers. I'm fine with using a cheap one of a pricey one of whatever the product is. But if I'm buying something it's because I need it. Any whiff of reliability issues sends me elsewhere as I just do not need the stress in my life. Recording and gigging for me are a beloved hobby as opposed to my living, but even as a keen amatuer I won't risk it. My time is precious and I want to spend my hobby time doing pleasurable stuff, not fault-finding duff gear.

I've got three (!) "Eurorack" analogue mixers from Behringer that I bought in 1999 or 2000 or summat. They sound crap. The EQ is crap. The preamps are crap. I also had a "rackmount tuner" of theirs that I sold cos it was crap.

Unless they've seriously changed their crapness levels in recent years, and was rather skeptcial of Hugh's review of their new digital mixer in this month's SoS, which is apparently a "gamechanger". All I can mutter is "well it would bloody well need to be, because the game they've been playing up until now is crap". You know?

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~~~ A weasel hath not such a deal of spleen as you are tossed with! www.feline1.co.uk ~~~

Quote The Elf:

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There's snobbery both ways. Some people don't have many good things to say about Behringer just because they are believers in the 'reassuringly expensive'. Some simply want to appear to be 'cool' on internet fora! There's also a reverse snobbery with some people who seem to feel that any criticism of Behringer must be fought and defended. Of course, it's all nonsense.

Let's face it, a lot of B gear is cheap because it's built down to a price. You get what you pay for, in other words. If you're happy to accept a lower build standard for the sake of just being able to get going, then no problem, but don't be blinkered into believing that cheap always equates with good. Some days I don't want to eat McDonalds.

Some B gear is great for the money. Some does an 'OK job' for a knock-down price. Some of it is just pants. I'd include some of their DI boxes very much in the latter category - not only unreliable, but appallingly noisy and tinny when it *is* working. Some of it is also derivative, arguably to the point of plagiarism, and I would not be comfortable giving my money away for such gear - I voluntarily paid more for my cable tester, for instance.

But I do own and use some of their stuff and I have no problem with this. I'm no snob either way. If a piece of their gear works to an acceptable standard, then I'll use it, but if it doesn't meet my requirements then I'll pass and buy something else that does.

I've had two ADA-8000s fail too early in their lifespan, and one studio owner I know went through several of their headphone amps in an alarmingly short timespan before ditching them for another brand. That many of us are aware of that kind of track record makes us realistic about what we get with Behringer - it may be cheap, but it's not always cheerful, and when your living depends on your gear you need to be able to rely on it to an acceptable standard day after day.

Behringer aren't a cause or a religion that need to be defended, or championed. They simply make gear that should be viewed for what it is, and either does what you want, or doesn't.

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Spot-on your Elfness.

Let's see...

4 x Multicom compressors
2 x ADA8000 Pre amps
1 x FBQ3102 graphic
2 x DSP1124 Feedback Destroyers
1 x Composer compressor

In my time owning and using these, I had no failures.

I had a 602 mixer that was used as a keyboard submixer twice a week every week for three years.
2.5 years into this, the PSU cable failed. Not the PSU, the cable, due to the way that I was coiling it.
I've also had a MX2642 mixer for the past 15 years and the PSU on that has gone.
15 years though.
I've got rid of cars with less use than that.

That said, turning up for a festival with a rack full of Multicoms, etc and setting up next to the guy with the Drawmers, SPXs, DBXs and Klark Tekniks, etc would lead to gear envy...

Stu.

I've got a Mini Mon 800. Had it now for over 6 years and it's still going with no problems!

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www.thinkootb.com

Wasn't the original Behringer compressor meant to be good? The black faced one made in Germany. Copy of the Drawmer LX-20 I think

I have had the ADA8000 and that failed too early, until then it was fine, though I replaced it with an Octopre which immediately sounded much better.

I also had the mx8000, used it for years, no problem at all, though a little noisy

I use a BCF2000 - works fine

Today I am going to buy a DDX3216, I am getting it for a very low price, and at that price I am curious to see if it could replace my DM24, which is fine, but I fear the LCD will fail eventually, which is a known fault with the DM series and they are quite expensive to replace, in fact I am buying the DDX for less than it would cost to replace the LCD in the DM24

Quote Airfix:

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One has to hide ones behringers. It's the shame that's hard to live with.

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I know someone who had one of the Ultrafex enhancers and powder coated the front panel black so no-one would know what he was using.

I still have an Ultrafex here together with an ADA8000. The Ultrafex was bought at the time when Behringer were just a little cheaper than the competition rather the bargain basement brand they are now and it still works fine after nearly 20 years. I bought the ADA8000 used a few years ago and it has been fine - I understand that the US models are less reliable due to differences in the power supply design.

James.

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JRP Music - Audio Mastering and Restoration.
http://www.jrpmusic.net

Quote James Perrett:

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I bought the ADA8000 used a few years ago and it has been fine

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Do you use this for recording non-critical sources or does anything go, James? Really keen to have another look at one but have been told the convertors are mushy. Btu for that price, obviously...

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I'm All Ears.

Quote vinyl_junkie:

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Wasn't the original Behringer compressor meant to be good? The black faced one made in Germany. Copy of the Drawmer LX-20 I think

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Hard to pin that one down Vinyl as all their products are a copy of summat or other...

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Samplecraze
Stretch That Note

Quote vinyl_junkie:

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Wasn't the original Behringer compressor meant to be good? The black faced one made in Germany. Copy of the Drawmer LX-20 I think

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I seem to recall they had a much higher price tag, not 100% sure though, but I have some old around at home which probably have them in. I think I paid £90 for mine which was discounted as far I recall at the time. Not sure where mine was made though, I suspect China. Pretty sure mine is the MDX2100.

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http://soundcloud.com/richie-royale
http://www.mixcrate.com/richieroyale

Quote ken long:

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Quote James Perrett:

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I bought the ADA8000 used a few years ago and it has been fine

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Do you use this for recording non-critical sources or does anything go, James? Really keen to have another look at one but have been told the convertors are mushy. Btu for that price, obviously...

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I use it for all kinds of things - including some expensive mics sometimes. It sounds very similar to my ADAT LX20's and I wouldn't be surprised to find that they use the same Wavefront convertors. There is possibly a slight veil to the sound compared to other convertors I have but mic choice and mic position will have a much bigger effect on the sound than the ADA8000.

James.

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JRP Music - Audio Mastering and Restoration.
http://www.jrpmusic.net

Quote vinyl_junkie:

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Wasn't the original Behringer compressor meant to be good? The black faced one made in Germany. Copy of the Drawmer LX-20 I think

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It was a copy of the DL221 if I remember correctly (or maybe the 241). The Behringer was actually more expensive than the LX20 when it first came out.

James.

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JRP Music - Audio Mastering and Restoration.
http://www.jrpmusic.net

Quote James Perrett:

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Quote vinyl_junkie:

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Wasn't the original Behringer compressor meant to be good? The black faced one made in Germany. Copy of the Drawmer LX-20 I think

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It was a copy of the DL221 if I remember correctly (or maybe the 241). The Behringer was actually more expensive than the LX20 when it first came out.

James.

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Looks more like the 241, which is still £529 on DV.

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http://soundcloud.com/richie-royale
http://www.mixcrate.com/richieroyale

Quote James Perrett:

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I bought the ADA8000 used a few years ago and it has been fine - I understand that the US models are less reliable due to differences in the power supply design.

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A local studio (UK) had two fail in a couple of months and have gone through six in the last three years or so. At least two failures were power supply I'm told. My own ADA-8000s have been solid.

When mic pre's are running short I will farm out less critical sources to ADA-8000. Their worst crime IMO is the horrible gain controls that switch to 'INSANELY LOUD' between the next-to-last and last click of their turn. Despite their click controls, matching levels between a pair of ADA-8000 inputs is bit hit and miss.

Sound-wise they can sound a bit dull - not 'bad', but just lacking in the sparkle and detail you might expect from something sexier. For drum recording I get something extra back from them for tom mic's - a nice 'smack' I don't get from my Fireface's pre's, for example -so it's not all bad!

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An Eagle for an Emperor, A Kestrel for a Knave.

I have a BCR I don't use much, a patchbay I don't use at the moment, a cheap 8-channel mixer I used to use for monitoring (actually, the sonic difference between driving my DT 770s from the Behringer to driving it from a MOTU 2408 mkII was huge - much bigger than I expected) and a newly-acquired ADA8000.

Any opinions on the sonic quality (or lack thereof) of the ADA8000 converters (ie when using it with line-level sources, not using the mic amps)? It is by far the cheapest ADAT box you can get, and it has gotten some good press in various SOS articles over the years...

Edited by Karl H. (19/07/12 11:49 AM)

Quote James Perrett:

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Quote vinyl_junkie:

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Wasn't the original Behringer compressor meant to be good? The black faced one made in Germany. Copy of the Drawmer LX-20 I think

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It was a copy of the DL221 if I remember correctly (or maybe the 241). The Behringer was actually more expensive than the LX20 when it first came out.

James.

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Ah right, thanks for the info

Here are some pics of what they look like (not mine)

http://www.mahosta.de/studio/verkauf/studiocomp.php

On a different note the BCR MIDI controllers are actually pretty good, I've been contemplating getting one to control my Alpha Juno with (poor man's PG)

In the past I had:

An a500 power amp that sounded quite brittle, and seemed to have a design flaw where having the volume knobs in the middle of their range introduced distortion, no distortion at full volume though.

A 32 (maybe 34) channel mixer that had horrible crosstalk, barely adequate sound and died suddenly one day.

A rack compressor that would be gone if I could find the allen key for the rack bolts.

A rack mount digital FX thing which is utterly useless as all the sounds are thin and nasty.

Can't imagine I'd buy anything from them in the future.

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I've never liked a solo violin, you need at least five for a proper fire.

I have a Behringer 8 way headphone amp I use for quiet rehearsals. I got it 'cause I thought sound quality wasn't too much of an issue, as it's only for rehearsal.

It's worked for a year so far.

Having said that, if I compare the behringer headphone output to the original output, it sounds pretty bad (unpleasant top-end), and there's an intermittent noise.

I wouldn't want to rely on it for live work, or mixing decisions.

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www.thediplomatz.com

Quote Zukan:

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the best doorstops I've ever come across after Samson Servos and the C1000.

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But you've got to stamp repeatedly on a C1000 to get the basket into a suitable wedge shape, so that it fits under the door. By happy coincidence, I've often found myself wanting to stamp repeatedly on a C1000...

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Mixing Secrets for the Small Studio
A complete mixing method based around the techniques of the world's most famous producers.

Just starting using a BCF 2000, no probs !

Also using a 4-channel Euro-Rack (?) mixer for foldback to my IEMs, fine also.

I have a foot pedal "kill switch" for my keyboards (it's complicated), it's either a little buzzy or it's my cables, etc., haven't troubleshooted that yet.

And I have a cable tester, which seems to work.

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Alexis -Cubase 6.5.0/SX3.1.1.944, XP SP2, 4GB RAM (1GB not accessible, but used just to balance the computer so it doesn't tip over); Delta 66 in Omni i/O Studio; Motif8; UAD-1

Active DI box and ADA8000 here. No problems with either yet. Both seem quiet to me, or at least below the noise floor of my monitoring/recording environment. It was either a new $500 audio interface or the $180 ADA8000 to upgrade my E-Mu 1010 PCI audio interface. Happy with the ADA8000 after a few months.

I had one of their digital guitar modeling rack mount processors for about a week a few years ago before selling it. Way too much noise and horrible guitar tones.

So, yes, it's apparently a crap shot with their gear, but it certainly has its place in the amateur demo/writing studio on a budget.

Just thought of one hiccup I've had with the ADA8000 that may be of consequence to other ADA8000 owners here. The DA converters on the outputs of recent models go to sleep after a short number of cycles with no signal. As a result, there can be horrible audio fade ins that act almost like awful latency. Behringer claims the new DA converters of the recent hardware revision have better sound quality, but my guess is that their just cheaper.

To fix the problem, I keep an inaudible white noise signal sent to the ADA8000 output when in use for things like re-amping soft synths and guitar (for use with Ableton looper, for example).

Some nice discussion of the problem here, where I was very happy to find the solution...

http://www.gearslutz.com/board/music-computers/537785-strange-playback-pro blem-digi-002-ada8000.html#post7983343

Also, there are DIY mods which can be made to bypass the mic preamp for line level sources. The fact that the mic preamps are not bypassed for line level input is claimed to be the reason the ADA8000 does not perform optimally for those sources. I have only used mine as a mic pre into my DAW.

As mentioned before: you get what you pay for! When I compare the build quality of my ZED14 mixer with "B" stuff, the ZED wins hands-down! However: I'm surprised how it is possible that "B" sells some of it's products for such little money and still make a profit...

I do have:

• BCF2000 - more than 5 year old and works like a charm!
  
• Ultra Patch PX3000 - about two year old, no problems so far.
  
• Bass V-Amp - about one year old, since a few days the right output seams to have a lose contact (I still have to check the cable...)

My conclusion: I cannot imagine that a professional studio buys "B" stuff, but there certainly is a place for some budget equipment in my humble "hobby-studio"

Quote Wimek:

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My conclusion: I cannot imagine that a professional studio buys "B" stuff, but there certainly is a place for some budget equipment in my humble "hobby-studio"

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I agree, but I've bought a Behringer headphone amp and DI box, and at no point did I feel like I was getting a premium product at a discount price. Just a cheap and cheerful bit of kit. There is a market for that, though, clearly.

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www.thediplomatz.com