Cuppla things.
I don't find the mic pres over noisy. They do have some compromises 'though that need to be taken into consideration.
Firstly, I guess, for the sake of cost, Mackie chose to use linear taper pots for the pre-amp gain control. They should really have used logarithmic taper (or audio taper as some prefer to call it) but hey, once you know, it's OK. The upshot of this is that most of the needed gain occurs between the 2 and 4 o'clock position which makes them seem ridiculously sensitive in that region. The pots are also not of the highest standard and can exhibit scratchiness in the setting up procedure around the aforementioned region. Once set however, they are fine. You can jump in and spray some IPA in them but that's a short term remedy and they'll wind up scratchy again.
Secondly, you need to gain stage your input to output properly.
If you are choosing to use busses, which I prefer as a routing concept (I'm an old analog guy), you need to be aware that if you choose an odd buss (1, 3, 5, 7) (we're talking about desk input channels 1-24 here but it also relates to tape returns etc., if you intend to do a mix/bounce to another set of tracks) the pan pot needs to be hard left. Similarly, choosing even busses (2, 4, 6, 8, duh!) requires the pan pot to be hard right. This will provide max signal to the relevant output busses. If the pan pot is centered, you are losing 6dB of available level to your bus/track of interest.
Play with that for a while and make some music.
Here endeth the lesson until next time.
Peter
