Macke Big Knob vs Presonus Central Station

[DIALTWISTER]

Hello,

 

Im interested in:

 

Mackie Big Knob

http://mackie.com/products/bigknob/index.html

 

and

 

Presonus Central Station

http://www.presonus.com/centralstation.html

 

Does anyone own either of these?

 

I hear the Presonus should be better because it is "passive". However in EQ this month ( September ) they review the Big knob and they say it sounds great and it has a loud headphone amp.

 

So I dont know!

 

Does anyone know if the Presonus's headphone amp is loud... this is kinda important to me.

 

Im looking to replace my old Tascam M1600 mixer... would that be considered a passive or active route to my speakers?

 

I had the original Mackie 1604 and it was solid but the sound wasnt steller... Id hate to put something in the signal that would be noticable. But that was a long time ago...

 

Please let me know your impressions, thoughts...

 

Thank you very much!

[Philip OKeefe]

You might also want to consider the Samson C-Control. I think I paid about $100 for mine, and it does great for what I need, and it's pretty sonically transparent.

 

http://www.samsontech.com/products/productpage.cfm?prodID=1650&brandID=2

 

http://www.sweetwater.com/images/items/CControl.jpg

 

Sweetwater sells them for $99.97

[Philip OKeefe]

BTW, the headphone out is plenty loud, but that is going to depend on the impedance of the cans you're going to use with it - but that's true of all such devices. What headphones are you using?

[Philip OKeefe]

Double post - sorry.

[Duddits]

Of course, what is acceptable depends on your studio and budget, and none of these will be completely transparent, and certainly not as transparent as something like the Grace Design 906, but that costs six thousand smackers.

 

After looking into it myself I settled on the PreSonus CentralStation, along with its optional remote, which gives you a "big knob" (if that's your thing), but in a more convenient package.

 

Mackie has been making an effort to appeal to more hoytie-toytie customers, but there's little doubt that the circuitry in the Big Knob is going to be less kind to your audio than what's inside the CentralStation.

 

I'm pretty finicky about what I use. After all, I am a cat. But I am genuinely impressed with the Central Station. The fidelity is fantastic, especially given its price, and the design is just what it should be. You really have no need for the manual at all -- it just all makes sense.

 

The main thing with the Central Station is what it does sound-wise at the price; the main thing with the Big Knob is how cool it is. But having looked into these things (and the Grace Design unit as well), the Central Station seems like the only low-cost option that gives you truly high-fidelity results.

[Dave The Rave]

Hi Dialtwister,

 

I just went through this exact same decision process myself. There are some features in the Big Knob that I really like (e.g. the RIAA pre-amps for record deck magnetic cartridge input), but there's one big black mark against the Big Knob IMO.

 

The PreSonus Central Station doesn't have any RIAA pre's in it, BUT it doesn't have the one big black mark against it.

 

The big issue? Simple - wires! With the Big Knob, you have to run all the inputs/outputs/speaker wires etc. up onto the top of your working space/mixing desk (whatever) - that's a real pain IMO. With the PreSonus Central Station, using the remote controller, you can leave all the wiring at the back of your rack. The CSR-1 remote control only has one wire to trapse over your desk. For me, that was the deciding factor. I figure I could use my old Sony home stereo receiver for the record deck pre's if I really need them.

 

I ordered my Central Station and CSR1 from Sweetwater on Friday. Should be here next week. I'll report back with my comments/thoughts on it then.

 

Cheers,

:DTR

[Duddits]

I forgot that but you're right, and I remember thinking that myself. Once you plug in the Big Knob, you really can't move it around. Because of all the wires, it has to stay put.

 

The Central Station is really divided into two, so the wires go to the back of the rackmounted unit as they should, rather than clutter up your working area, and the remote you just take around with you wherever you want.

[DIALTWISTER]

Duddits,

 

How loud can the Headphone's be driven with the Central Station?

 

I was set on the Central Station because of the sound issue but listen to what EQ magazine says:

 

"And the sound? Big Knob delivers big time. The sound is clean, open, full, dynamic, and rich. Having spent many hours on Mackie boards, I expected good clear, neutral sonics. But Big Knob defintiely raises the bar toward high-end analog tonality; Im quite impressed."

-Mitch Gallagher, Sept Issue

 

The erogonimics issue doesnt matter to me as I have an Omnirax desk with holes for wires I could snake down to... and I also have rack space under my monitor speakers that would be ok for the Presonus".

 

I wish EQ also had a review of the Central Station...

 

Using my Tascam M1600... is that considered passive or active?

 

Thanks again for the replies. I think many people will be interested in this especially as time goes on.

[Aaron Carey]

good luck finding a big knob in real life

 

backordered, vaporware

 

Does the presonus have three true speaker outs? or is it 1 powered speaker out and two sharing an amp?

[Duddits]

Originally posted by DIALTWISTER:

Duddits,

 

How loud can the Headphone's be driven with the Central Station?

To give you a decent answer, I just plugged three representative headphones into it and checked.

 

Sennheiser HD 414s: These require more juice than the next two, and were plenty loud. Worked fine without turning volume up all the way on the CS.

 

Audio Technica ATH-M40s: (I really like these headphones, btw): enough juice from the CS to get way too loud, if that's your thing.

 

Sony MDR-7506 (popular, bright, headphones): enough juice from the CS to blow out your ear drums if that's your thing.

[Duddits]

Originally posted by DIALTWISTER:

I was set on the Central Station because of the sound issue but listen to what EQ magazine says:

 

"And the sound? Big Knob delivers big time. The sound is clean, open, full, dynamic, and rich. Having spent many hours on Mackie boards, I expected good clear, neutral sonics. But Big Knob defintiely raises the bar toward high-end analog tonality; Im quite impressed."

-Mitch Gallagher, Sept Issue

For the engineering goal (neutral solid state at a great price) the Mackie mixers are famously successful, and have gained a deserved reputation in a certain niche as "good, clear sonics." And from what I understand, the Big Knob is slightly better than the sonics found within Mackie's usual boards. Which is great. It looks like a fantastic product, and it seems like it would suit many people's needs.

 

However, up a couple of niches on the audio totem pole, Mackie's analog products distort higher-end gear. Whether it's worth the considerably greater sum of money to buy the higher-end gear is anyone's call, but there's no question that a Mackie mixer will "muffle" sound at that level.

 

Thus, from the perspective Mitch is discussing, the perspective in which Mackie is "good, clear, neutral sonics," the Big Knob "raises the bar toward high-end analog tonality."

 

From the perspective of higher fidelity (not the purpose of Mitch's article), the Big Knob, Mackie Mixers, and the Central Station will all dirty the picture a bit. So the question is which dirties the picture the least?

 

I think it's the Central Station. Given its design, I believe the Central Station raises the bar toward high-end analog tonality even higher than the Big Knob, high enough, in fact, that I put off buying a truly high end solution costing thousands more.

 

In the room I put the Central Station in, I've got some pretty kick-ass monitor-age -- custom stuff by a top designer (he's done stuff for Abby Road, Sony Mastering, Stevie Wonder, etc.). I was skeptical of the Central Station, but now that I've got it, I'm surprised at how good it is.

 

I don't mean to diss the Big Knob, and perhaps I might have been pleasantly surprised if I bought that instead. But from what I understand, the Central Station's passive design is simply more of a "straight wire" than the Big Knob, and less apt to have a sonic signerature.

 

Originally posted by DIALTWISTER:

I wish EQ also had a review of the Central Station...

For what it's worth, I find that unless it's a direct comparison (which the mags tend to shy away from), it's really hard to compare a review of one thing with another, since reviewers' writing styles differ so much.

 

Originally posted by DIALTWISTER:

Using my Tascam M1600... is that considered passive or active?

I believe that's active. Both the Big Knob and the Central Station are essentially one part of the mixer -- the part that routes audio for monitoring -- taken out of the mixer and put into their own box and given special attention. It's the same approach as an outboard mic pre: rather than use a $2 mic pre that is part of a mixer that does a whole lot of different tasks, you spend $2000 on an outboard mic pre that does this one thing and one thing only, but does it very well.

 

Mackie and PreSonus realize that as people move away from mixing boards, they still need the mixing board's monitoring section. Some people continue to use the mixers pretty much only for the monitoring section! Therefore, why not just make the monitoring section as its own little thing? Hence the proliferation of this kind of thing.

[Duddits]

Originally posted by Aaron Carey:

Does the presonus have three true speaker outs? or is it 1 powered speaker out and two sharing an amp?

None of the three sets of monitor outputs is powered. Volume trims are passive, hence no amplifier stages w/ op amps or active ICs.

 

Thus, you'd connect these outputs to the inputs of active (powered) speakers, or a power amp that in turn was connected to a non-active speaker.

 

There is also a Main line output for connecting to a recording device (no volume trim, no active circuitry) as well as a Cue output in back and two phone jacks on the front which toggle between Cue and Main output.

[KB Gunn]

Like Phil, I also have a C-Control by Samson. I think it works great and gives me talkback and multiple in/out flexibility. Best of all is it does it for very low price.

[aliengroover]

Another vote for the C-Control. Don't sell it short because of the price. It's a great piece.

Peace

[Matt.Hepworth]

For you Samson users, particularly Phil, is it the link between your interface and your ADAM's?!?!?! I'm very afraid of the unit, to be honest, but if people use it directly between the monitors and the DAW, then I'd look at it. As it is, I'm waiting for a Big Knob. The Central Station could be cool, but it wouldn't be central (within reach) in my setup since it's not a tabletop unit.

[where02190]

Haven't played with the Big Knob, but we put the Central station and the C-control side by side in listening tests as well as doing some waveform analysis and the results were there was no difference between the two. The C-control is a great piece of gear for it's price, and one looking into the Presonus uint shoudldefintley not be shyed away from the Samson because of price.

[Philip OKeefe]

Matt, I run an analog out from my board and into the C-Control, and directly from there into my ADAM S3-A's via the +4 "A" output. I also send the "B" output into an Ebtech -10 to +4 passive converter (a transformer) and then to my power amp and JBL 4412's. That way I can switch between the two as needed, without a level change between the two sets of monitors. I also have the "C" output routed to the cheapest pair of computer speakers I could find - just for a "worst possible case scenario" reference.

 

IMO, probably the biggest drawback to the C-Control is that only one pair of outputs is +4 and the other two are at -10. IMO, if they wanted to do a MK II version of it, the biggest improvement they ould make would be to put -10 / +4 switches on it so you could set it up for what you needed.

 

The main things I use the Samson for is monitor switching, level, dim, and mono. I don't bring in any 2 track inputs nor do I use it for talkback - I have something else set up for that. I'm not really sure if you can send it a seperate stereo aux send and have that routed out to the cue system while monitoring the main stereo mix in the control room... I didn't need it for that, so I never tried to set it up that way. But if it can't do that it would seriously diminish the usefulness of the onboard talkback mic IMO.

 

Does it color the sound? I generally hold the opinion that any active electronics will change the sound, but the question is, how much? And the Samson really isn't messing with what I am hearing in any significant way. I was all set to hate the thing too - I mean, come on - a $100 box between the source and my $5,000 monitors? But I was quite surprised with the performance of the unit.

 

I'll have to find it, but Mitch (or maybe it was John) gave it a good review in EQ, and my personal experience with it is in agreement with their findings.

[KB Gunn]

Thanks Where for the analysis of the Samson v. Presonus. It made me feel great that I got such a good deal for an excellent unit.

 

Regards

[miroslav]

Originally posted by Philip O'Keefe:

I run an analog out from my board and into the C-Control...

 

..........

 

The main things I use the Samson for is monitor switching, level, dim, and mono. I don't bring in any 2 track inputs nor do I use it for talkback - I have something else set up for that.

Phil...don't remember which board you have...

...but can't you do monitor switching/dimming/muting...and talkback...

...right from your board...???

 

I'm interested in some of these new "toys"...but I'm still trying to figure out why I would need one...???

 

On my TASCAM 3500...I can switch between three sets of monitors...A/B and also Studio...

...and I can dim/mute/mono...and talkback too...

...so I guess I have no need of these "toys" for now...but maybe later on if I ever dump my board and outboard gear and mix all-in-the-box-digital...

...NOT!!!

 

Well...I might think about it if/when my board completely dies...though I just might go out and get another board.

I just hate the whole mixing-in-the-box thing...but I do like to use the DAW for edits and as a playback device.

[Mats Olsson.]

I don't exactly what functions you need most, but if you "only" need a high quality D/A with a output attenuator and a headphone out, perhaps a Benchmark DA-1 would be just what you need? Sonically it is really good.

 

Other quality solutions to consider:

Martinsound MAX

 

Studio Technologies - StudioComm

 

Sound Performance Lab - SPL MTC 2381 Monitor & Talkback Controller

[aliengroover]

That review of the Samson is on EQ's site.

 

Here it is: http://www.eqmag.com/archive/0803/0803_Reviews8.htm

Peace

[DIALTWISTER]

Phillip,

 

Im using Sony MDR7506 headphones... I guess if your headphone's are loud using the Samson then these would be also.

 

Is there an official rackmount kit for the Samson?

 

Does anyone know if it will also run on 220V? (Im moving to europe next year).

 

Really interesting... 3 choices... hmmm....

[Duddits]

As always, YMMV, and if you're happy with something, hey, that's all that matters.

 

For what it's worth, I've heard some unhappy grumbling about the C-Control from a few other folks. One person was complaining the left/right balance was off. Maybe some units work better than others.

 

Just to satisfy my curiosity (which killed the cat, I know), I just did a search at Gearslutz. Here are two threads in which people compare the C-Control, Big Knob, and Central Station:

 

C-Control thread 1

 

C Control thread 2

[DIALTWISTER]

Duddits,

 

Ah thanks for those links...!

 

Definitely a big "-" towards the Samson... You think thats true about being Sam Ash's son?

 

heh...

 

I bet someone else will come out with these units... maybe Motu will just start incorparating this stuff into its interfaces... that would be killer.

[Duddits]

Originally posted by DIALTWISTER:

Ah thanks for those links...!

 

Definitely a big "-" towards the Samson...

All of these things are "niche" products, and if they suit your niche and do the job, then that's great. But in a competitive market with not a whole lot of profit margin, something for $100 is not going to equal something for $500 which is not going to equal something for $5000. It costs Mackie and PreSonus more to make the Big Knob and CentralStation than what Samson charges customers for the C-Control: you just can't equal the BK or CS for $100.

 

The C-Control is therefore great if that's all you can spend, but it's not going to be better than the BK or CS. They're great if you want to spend around $500 ($400 BK, more for the CS w/ optional remote), but they're not going to be better than the Grace thingamajig for $5000. For me, for now, for my new room, the Central Station is the sweet spot. If the C-Control @ $100 or Grace Design @ $5000 is your sweet spot than that's the ticket.

 

Originally posted by DIALTWISTER:

You think thats true about being Sam Ash's son?

I know it's true -- I know the guy. Richie Ash. One tough cookie and a friend for years.

 

Originally posted by DIALTWISTER:

I bet someone else will come out with these units... maybe Motu will just start incorparating this stuff into its interfaces... that would be killer.

Maybe....

 

Motu's already made significant steps to help us get rid of our consoles and it's possible that they will incorporate these routing functions into an interface so that we REALLY DON'T NEED ANYTHING ELSE. But with the movement to banish the console and have little boxes take care of what the console used to do, there may be diminishing returns after a certain point, and maybe it's actually more convenient to offer this last vestige of a console -- monitor routing -- in its own little package.

 

Phil would be better able than I to talk about the O1X (he reviewed it for EQ). The O1X takes this philosophy to the next level and says to the world : "I CAN DO IT ALL." The question is whether we really want one device that takes over everything -- console, controller, Audio I/O, MIDI, routing, etc. While it seems like a great idea, I can't help but think that we're better served by having some flexibility over individual components, mixing and matching which audio I/O we want, which router we want (C-Control/Big Knob/CS/Grace/etc.), which control surface we want, etc.

[DIALTWISTER]

Im definetly a person who does better with a mouse then a thing like Digidesign's ICON... Im a keyboard shortcut, read the manual person... no need to anything other than a screen and sound. I hope Motu or something just puts it all in one nice unit. Less space the better.

 

If only they could make it so the Bass wouldnt bother neighbors... I could stop paying for a seperate studio!

[doug osborne]

Our intent with MultiMAX in the mid-'90s and more recently MonitorMAX was to replace the center section of a large format console with audio quality at least as good as that console. Studios with consoles that lacked surround monitoring features could add MultiMAX and continue working. Studios with no console could add MultiMAX for surround work or MonitorMAX for two-channel work. We have been making MultiMAXs since '98, and up until about a year ago there were more Martinsound monitor controllers out there than all the other units combined.

 

Studio Technologies and Audient were our competition (and Grace, SPL, and others have joined the mid- and high-end), but with the recent addition of Samson, Mackie, Coleman, etc., a whole market opened its eyes to something they needed and now they could afford. Our products cost more than the computers to which they are connected...

 

We expected this whole catagory to go away two or three years ago - wouldn't console, computer audio interface, and control surface makers design proper monitoring features into their products? Well, they haven't, yet.