Mixers/Consoles I want to practice mixing with my Behringer X32. How do I do this?

lugamil

Member
Recently we bought a Behringer X32 Console which, in the future, will be used to mix live sound. I wanted to get some practice in and test some things out but I don't know how. What I want is to get some tracks in the mixer (from a PC?).

I tried connecting a PC over USB with the interface on the back of the console but that didn't work. I googled a bit and found out I had to install drivers from the website so I installed what I could find (I think they are the right ones but not sure). I now have a program that asks me to select a console but the dropdown menu sais "no device found".

Appreciate any help.
 
Welcome to Control Booth!

What you're looking for is often called "virtual sound check" and using that as your search term should help you find more info.

I suspect you have a signal routing issue. I think you have to select inputs from "Card" (the expansion card in the back of the mixer) in order to get the tracks from your computer. Most mixerpersons configure a "scene" to do the switching between regular inputs (whether local XLR or S16/32 remote stage boxes) and the card. I don't have an X32 in front of me so I can't give you a step by step, but I'm betting you have enough info to figure it out now. :)
 
It's not clear from your note whether you are trying to record a mixer output on the PC via the USB, or trying to get Xcontrol to connect to the X32. The USB is used for sound signals, a network connection is used for control and settings. Take a look in your Quick Start manual and find the "PC/Mac Control Configuration" section. That will tell you how to connect for control. Further sections of that document talk to DAW setup which is the question of recording.
In all of this, YouTube is your friend. There are hundreds (my estimate) of training videos from churches, schools, and theaters on various aspects of X32 use.
 
Welcome to Control Booth!

What you're looking for is often called "virtual sound check" and using that as your search term should help you find more info.

I suspect you have a signal routing issue. I think you have to select inputs from "Card" (the expansion card in the back of the mixer) in order to get the tracks from your computer. Most mixerpersons configure a "scene" to do the switching between regular inputs (whether local XLR or S16/32 remote stage boxes) and the card. I don't have an X32 in front of me so I can't give you a step by step, but I'm betting you have enough info to figure it out now. :)

First of all, thank you for the help. I didn't know it was called "virtual sound check".

I forgot to mention this in my original post but when I plug the console into my PC, windows straight up tells me it does not recognize the device. My problem lies right there.

I knew about the routing settings and I changed these but that didn't help.

EDIT: I also tried 2 different PCs
 
You need a program that can see all the sound devices first, get Audacity for that. https://www.audacityteam.org/

Install the X-Live driver : https://www.musictribe.com/Categories/Behringer/Mixers/Digital/X32/p/P0ASF/downloads

Then fire up audacity. You should see 16 separate sound cards. After that, go here and download some multi-tracks: https://behindthespeakers.com/300-free-multitracks/

Load each multi track into a separate channel and that should do ya.

Odds are you downloaded X32 Edit, and that works over the network connection, not the USB connections.
 
There is more than one USB port on an X32, and it's easy to grab the wrong one. Plug the computer into the port on the accessory card. Then, there are three different types of accessory cards, X-USB, X-UF, and X-Live. A new X32 normally ships with an X-USB card. The X-UF has both USB and a firewire port. The X-Live card has USB and two slots for flash cards. There are different drivers for each type of card, and only the correct driver will work. Most likely you need "X-USB Asio Driver 4.11" for an X-USB card.

Once the right driver is installed and working, then the DAW software has to be configured to output to the appropriate channels.
 
You need a program that can see all the sound devices first, get Audacity for that. https://www.audacityteam.org/

Install the X-Live driver : https://www.musictribe.com/Categories/Behringer/Mixers/Digital/X32/p/P0ASF/downloads

Then fire up audacity. You should see 16 separate sound cards. After that, go here and download some multi-tracks: https://behindthespeakers.com/300-free-multitracks/

Load each multi track into a separate channel and that should do ya.

Odds are you downloaded X32 Edit, and that works over the network connection, not the USB connections.

I downloaded all the software from the website but I figured out fairly quickly that I needed X-Live. X-Live however tells me it can't find a device and when I uplug the USB and plug it back in, windows gives an error saying that it can't communicate with the device.
 
There are settings in a console menu to enable 8/16/32 channels in and out on the X-Live USB port. I assume if that isn't set, the computer may not see it. I don't have either of my X32 consoles out at the moment, but I might have time to take a look later this evening. Take a look at the X-Live quick start manual, too.

Make sure you have firmware 3.09 installed on the console. Older versions of firmware will not work with X-Live.
 
I downloaded all the software from the website but I figured out fairly quickly that I needed X-Live. X-Live however tells me it can't find a device and when I uplug the USB and plug it back in, windows gives an error saying that it can't communicate with the device.

The X-Live card is the one that records multitrack to SD card as well as providing USB connection. If the expansion/accessory card installed in your mixer is not X-Live, the X-Live drivers will not find one....
 
Not sure if this is helpful, (I could have completely misunderstood the question) but we work with an X32 at my HS, and to play a track we always just hook it up to a computer or phone with an Aux cord that goes to on of the Aux inputs. That's the simplest way I can think of to sound check a system. But if you are more interested in operating the board from a computer, please feel free to disregard this advice.
 
Not sure if this is helpful, (I could have completely misunderstood the question) but we work with an X32 at my HS, and to play a track we always just hook it up to a computer or phone with an Aux cord that goes to on of the Aux inputs. That's the simplest way I can think of to sound check a system. But if you are more interested in operating the board from a computer, please feel free to disregard this advice.
He's wanting to play back multi-track recordings of a show in order to practice line-by-line mixing, DCA assignment and console programming, etc.
 
Late to the party: Your console likely has the X-USB card, not the X-Live card (which has two SD card slots on it). If this is the case, you need the X-USB driver that is available here: https://www.behringer.com//Categori...ries/X-USB/p/P0AZP/Downloads#googtrans(en|en)

I would use the TracksLive if you want to keep multitrack recording and playback as simple as possible. It's free and available at https://www.waves.com/mixers-racks/tracks-live#presenting-tracks-live When you want to get more into using the DAW for 'in-the-box' mixdowns, Reaper is very inexpensive and available at https://www.reaper.fm/
 

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