Digital or analog?

[NHStech]

Church is getting behringer x32. One deacon does not see need for the digital audio snake as it is an extra cost and we already have an analog that is functional. What are the best arguments for going digital with the snake? Thanks.

 

[TJCornish]

If your analog snake is meeting your needs, why would you replace it?

 

[jkowtko]

Yeah, unfortunately I find it hard to justify the cost myself. The basic advantage other that the minor differences in very high quality sound which you would likely never be able to detect, is bulk of the actual cable, and convenience of setup (if you can bury the digital cable in a wall and work off of wall jacks). In some respects it may be less convenient to have a digital snake because (a) it needs AC power, and (b) it has a bulky chassis, two things that an analog snake don't bring to the table.

 

[rwhealey]

Church is getting behringer x32. One deacon does not see need for the digital audio snake as it is an extra cost and we already have an analog that is functional. What are the best arguments for going digital with the snake? Thanks.

The only upside is that you can easily relocate the snake head and expand to additional channels. A single CAT5 cable is easy to run and extend. Not so easy with a big multicore cable. If you're happy with the location of your analog snake head and the number of inputs, you won't see any benefit with going to the digital snake. You can always add it later if you need it.

 

[AudJ]

I was hoping to get a digital snake for my board, for the reason of needing additional channels, which will work in my situation, but with the X-32, my understanding is that the snake increases #of inputs, but not channel count - is that accurate?

If it is, that reason for a digital snake is out of consideration. The other benefits dealing with portability are presumably also a non-factor in an install.

However, the point about stage input location is a good one. The snake for an X-32 is economical compared to most, so if you need better input positioning, go for it. But the unit is still over-kill compared to re-wiring existing ones analog.

 

[FMEng]

Every model of X32, from the 1 rack-unit Core, the Rack, the Producer, the Compact, and the full size X32 can mix the same number of channels, 40. But they have different numbers of on-board mic preamps. The full X32 has 32 preamps.

The Compact and Producer have 16 on-board preamps. By connecting one or more I/O boxes, you can increase the number of available preamps that can be routed to the 40 channels.