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A U D I O M E D I A M A Y 1 9 9 8
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strips are peppered with little round navigation
buttons that assign that to the Channel Strip.
You don’t have to hunt for a select button, for
example, when you want to get into
the EQ – just press the button where
the EQ would normally be and the
Channel Strip is at your disposal. The
screen for that bay then displays the
detail of that control down its right-
hand side.
It’s worth mentioning the
compressor and EQ sections on this
console, mostly because Midas has
done an incredible amount of work
to give options and control to suit the
live sound engineer. Take for example,
work done on interpolation of the EQ
control. Midas says that one difficult
aspect of most digital EQs is the ability
to ‘dial in’ the right frequency – sweep
the frequency of an analogue EQ
and a good engineer will settle in the right place
almost immediately. Try that on a standard digital
EQ and it will take some twiddling to hone in on
your target. Thus by doing analogue-like phase
shifting and detailed interpolation Midas claims
to have fixed this particular bugbear and make a
better EQ in the mean time.
In fact, there are several EQ types available
to the user, just as there are a wide selection of
compression types based on RMS, Peak, Linear,
and Vintage types. Again, Midas says it has been
working on these algorithms almost as long as it’s
been working on the console in order to
provide the best fundamental tools for
the XL8 user.
Plug And Play
Also on board you’ll find a large array
of plug-ins. The list will continue to
grow but for now the console has 16
stereo effects processors with a choice
of auto-panner, chorus, stereo delay,
DN780 reverb, stereo flanger, Midas
reverb, and graphic EQs. As mentioned
earlier, graphic EQ control is via the Helix
Rapide controller.
On the centre section of the console
you’ll find the 12 VCA group masters,
16 auxiliary masters (and associated
‘detail’ section), and 16 matrix masters,
as well as the main output controls, monitor,
talkback and oscillator controls, dual track balls,
and more.
In monitor mode you can bring the auxiliary
mixes onto the faders, and lock particular
auxiliaries to the two knobs on each channel
strip. By assigning your mixes to the first 16
auxiliaries and the 16 matrix outputs you have
access to the first 32 mixes right there in front of
you, with only a single button press required
to bring the next 16 auxes onto the surface.
The solo section has A and B solo busses,
which are exclusive. In other words, if a
channel’s solo is assigned as a ‘B’ solo it
cannot be an ‘A’ solo at the same time. This is
useful for driving two monitor outputs, or for
dual operator use for exampe. Incidentally,
the console does have freely assignable A
and B sections for dual operator use or for
convenience. Both sections scroll through the
channels independently.
The automation on the XL8 is, as you’d
expect, pretty comprehensive. The system
stores all settings, and can even store
parameter isolation settings within each
scene, though there is independent isolation
available as well. The main feedback centre for
this is the centre-section screen, though on
the surface itself and large illuminated ‘next’
button does the obvious, along with Last, Now,
Confirm, and Cancel buttons. You can use the
jog wheel to navigate through the scene list as
well – when the show isn’t quite ‘linear’.
Incidentally, the two screens that
correspond to the centre sections show, by
default, colour-coded metering for the entire
console, and the plug-in rack.
There’s plenty more to talk about, but that
will have to wait for another issue. One point
of interest may well be the three KVM switches
inside the console and data tunnelling over
the network. This means you can feed
external video in to the console and switch
the screens around, you could plug-in your
laptop control system and run that from the
console controls, or you could even throw
TCP/IP and USB data around the auditorium.
For a Sound Reinforcement community becoming
ever-more reliant on those kinds of systems, these
are nice extras.
Conclusion
The Midas XL8 is not cheap, but it does offer the
kind of scale, fail-safes, and completeness that is
hard, if not impossible, to find elsewhere. For a
company that was exclusively analogue not so
long ago to recruit the right people and create
such a sophisticated and SR-friendly product as
this is an incredible achievement. Will it live up
to the legacy left by the outgoing XL4? I have a
feeling it will.
∫
For a company that
was exclusively
analogue not so
long ago to recruit
the right people
and create such
a sophisticated
and SR-friendly
product as this
is an incredible
achievement.
A U D I O M E D I A A P R I L 2 0 0 6
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I N F O R M A T I O N
£
Midas XL8 £194, 000 + VAT.
Midas (UK)
T
+44 (0)1562 741 515.
∑
www.midasconsoles.com
Midas USA (Telex Communications, Inc)
T
+1 952 736 4031 Ext. 84031
E
matt.larson@us.telex.com