John
January 18, 2008

Rating: 8/10

I upgraded to this firewire enabled mixer in order to record multiple tracks of audio simultaneously.
The set-up was very simple, just throw in the driver cd, follow the prompts, connect the mixer via the firewire and then turn it on to finish the installation, windows recognizes it and thats it.
Connect the control room outputs or main outputs to your amp. and you are good to go.
The lack of leads is a real breath of fresh air for me, as is the ability to record several seperate tracks simultaneously.

The software control panel is fairly simple and clear, as is the actual mixer itself.
The manual is rather slim, but it has everything you need to know covered and is written very clearly and is easy to follow.

Setting the channels up in Cubase is also pretty straight forward and is explained in the manual if you have any difficulty or are unfamiliar with the software.

The mic pre-amps are very quiet and very usable. The built in fx are also very decent.
The actual mixer itself also seems well constructed and is quite compact so it doesn't take up much space.

So far I am very pleased with this mixer and for the price it would seem hard to beat.
As I have said, the major selling point for me was the ability to record several seperate tracks of audio simultaneously (10 tracks in total I think, but I have only tried 2 so far), all through the firewire connection, which limits the amount of cables you will need to pretty much 1 other than what you will need to connect it to your amp.
It is basically plug in what you want to record, hit record on your chosen software (after it is set up to recognize the mixers channels).

Joe Haycocks
May 1, 2007

Rating: 9/10

Excellent value for money mixer.
After alot of research I bought the m12 for live use with my soundsystem.
I recieved it a couple of weeks ago (with extemely prompt shipping - thanks!), and used it in my studio for a while, just to play with it as much as anything else! Immediately I was impressed by the sound quality; no noise, loads of headroom, and the eq's sound perfect.
But, it was only when I took it out to it's first live gig that I realised how good it is, the faders are smooth (and the're 100mm), everthing's easy to find, clearly marked, and again, the headroom on the pre amps is huge. In other words typically soundcraft. I've used their bigger consoles, and this desk has exactly the same level of audio quality. I've chucked away my old behringer desk, as there's no way I'm using it again! Pretty much every feature is present and correct, with nothing in there that's a waste of money - quality connectors, faders and pots.
The ONLY gripe is that aux's 3&4 arent's swithable pre/post, but with aux's 1&2 being pre this isnt a major problem.
My opinion, for £300 it's perfect, but even if it was £400 it would still would be. Dont waste your money on anything else.