Soundcraft Si Expression 3 vs Compact 32 Comparison

THORNSZ

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i just want to hear your insights about this two mixers. Some say that the expression 3 is just a repackaging of the compact 32, while when i searched up about the compact 32... some say it is way advanced than the expression 3 plus it cost almost twice as the expression 3. We just bought the compact 32 by the way for my Church youth's worship facility..
 

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I don't know the difference but I also have a Compact 32 and love it. It sounds great and is super easy to use. The iPad app is crap, but I hear they're working on a mew version.
 
I don't know the difference but I also have a Compact 32 and love it. It sounds great and is super easy to use. The iPad app is crap, but I hear they're working on a mew version.

if you dont mind, how much it was when you bought it? we had a pretty good deal with proaudio star... cant wait for it! cons about is it that you cant record with it which sucks, tsk! i wanted to have the firewire expansion card together with the aviom card but it only has 1 card socket :( didnt realize that before we bought it.

hey, do you know somebody from houston, tx who can help us out set this up and teach volunteers how to use it?
 
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if you dont mind, how much it was when you bought it? we had a pretty good deal with proaudio star... cant wait for it! cons about is it that you cant record with it which sucks, tsk! i wanted to have the firewire expansion card together with the aviom card but it only has 1 card socket :( didnt realize that before we bought it.

I don't really want to say because I got dealer cost on it and it was a demo unit. But it was around a year ago, before these newer versions were released; now the dealer cost on them is next to nothing. Everyone's trying, all of a sudden, to compete with the Behringer. You know, expansion wasn't really an issue for me as I never intend to use it like that.
 
Does anyone know the cost of the Firewire/USB/ADAT option card for these things? I can't find it actually for sale anywhere. All I can find are the more "pro" option cards (Aviom, MADI etc.) which are ~$1000 (order of magnitude). I'm trying to decide between an X32 (Firewire built in, of course) and an Expression 3, but if adding the Firewire is going to push the cost up that much... :(
 
If I had to do it again and didn't care about name brand recognition (which I do, and I'm also a big Soundcraft fan) then I'd go with the Behringer. The Soundcraft sounds better and is easier to use if you're walking up to one for the first time, but the Behringer has a million more features. The iPad app alone is enough of a selling point for me, the Soundcraft one SUCKS! The X32 has multi function buttons that allow quick access to many of the console's parameters and features. The X32 has a bit more of a learning curve, but totally worth it.
 
agree, the behringer has way better features than the expression 3! the x32 was also an option for me before we purchased the Compact 32, but i considered the people who are gonna use it. We dont have a sound engineer so more likely the mixer is being run by volunteers with NO experience of any type of sound mixing. The SI Compact 32 is pretty much a basic mixer but reliable. I really caught up with the features of the Studiolive and the X32, but what the sound engineers said it is not that "reliable" yet coz that mixer is new and still under observation. We might change the mixer in a few years, maybe? One down side that i didnt notice from the Si Compact 32/Expression 3 is it doesnt have the record feature -_- which really sucks! i didnt notice that until we purchase it. crap! haha
 
crap, just got the mixer from the mail... SO STOKED with the audio quality knowing that its on factory settings! WAY BETTER than our old behringer eurodesk mixer!

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I've got the Compact 32 as a secondary console to our Si3 main console. It is incredibly easy to use and I think Soundcraft might have some videos on the console. I also find the soundcraft manuals are very easy to read. I'm in Corpus, so it is bit of a drive for me. But if I am ever in the area I will let you know.
 
I've got the Compact 32 as a secondary console to our Si3 main console. It is incredibly easy to use and I think Soundcraft might have some videos on the console. I also find the soundcraft manuals are very easy to read. I'm in Corpus, so it is bit of a drive for me. But if I am ever in the area I will let you know.

sweet! that'd be awesome

Congratulations on the new mixer. Let me know if you have any questions about it.

whoa, thanks man! as of now, i'm tryin to learn how to use it... i pretty much know that basics now but i'm trying to figure out how to apply the effects and how to monitor and mix with the headphone... i just cant find the control for it as of now
 
The effects are pretty easy. Just hit the LEX (Lexicon) button and use the screen and knobs to adjust parameters. To access the FX sends just press the corresponding FX button (there are four, to the right of the mixes and matrices buttons). That's your send level, then they return on the second layer. It's really annoying that you can't reconfigure that so that they can come up on the first layer, probably the thing I hate most about the console.

I believe the monitor section is under Setup on the screen. You can assign outputs to be the cue mix, adjust PFL/AFL, etc.
 
The effects are pretty easy. Just hit the LEX (Lexicon) button and use the screen and knobs to adjust parameters. To access the FX sends just press the corresponding FX button (there are four, to the right of the mixes and matrices buttons). That's your send level, then they return on the second layer. It's really annoying that you can't reconfigure that so that they can come up on the first layer, probably the thing I hate most about the console.

I believe the monitor section is under Setup on the screen. You can assign outputs to be the cue mix, adjust PFL/AFL, etc.

so we just hired a soundman to setup the mixer for us... when we're about to mix the graphic equalizer, we cant just access it because it is lock for no reason. We didnt made any security stuff to it, so its basically all factory settings. I was looking for some default password for the administrator but i cant find it. Do you have any experiences with this before? we're clueless on how making this work done.
 
Here's a link to the Compact Series user guide PDF.

Si Compact User Guide V2 (English)

Thanks man!

Yeah, do that hard reset. I think it's a combination of the Lexicon button, M1, and maybe a channel(?). That should wipe out whatever is causing it to be locked down.

What do you mean hard reset? isn't turning off and on resetting it? or do you mean reset it into factory settings? which i dont know how to... if yes, is it easy to do it or is it risky that it may corrupt the mixer's firmware?
 
What do you mean hard reset? isn't turning off and on resetting it? or do you mean reset it into factory settings? which i dont know how to... if yes, is it easy to do it or is it risky that it may corrupt the mixer's firmware?

Hard reset as in back to factory settings. The only thing you risk is loosing show files, and since you just got it, it's unlikely you'd loose anything important.
 

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