Presonus StudioLive 24.4.2 Digital Audio Mixer

Presonus StudioLive 24.4.2 Digital Audio Mixer

You’ll never go back to an old-school analog mixer once you’ve used StudioLive™. With its incredible signal-processing power on every channel, easy store and recall of every setting, and the ability to record it all with just two mouse clicks, you’ll get spoiled fast! Easier to use, better sounding, and flawlessly integrated with state-of-the-art software, it delivers the most creative environment possible for both live performance and studio music production.

But StudioLive is not simply a mixer, it’s a rapidly growing family of state-of-the-art, integrated hardware-software mixing and recording systems that deliver the features you need for live sound, live recording, and studio recording.The StudioLive 24.4.2 is a fine choice for those who want to mix small to medium-sized shows and worship services, and it’s a great choice for club systems, corporate applications, and educational institutions. And it’s the perfect hardware core for a project studio.

Here, in one device, are high-headroom XMAX™ microphone preamplifiers, a built-in FireWire recording and playback interface, more than 90 signal processors, a big library of DSP effects, 10 aux buses, 4 subgroups, extensive LED metering, mixer save and recall, channel-strip save/recall/copy/paste, talkback, and more. Yet despite its many controls and features, it’s compact and easy to transport.

Build live mixes that glisten with clarity and detail—then record and enhance the performance with the power of StudioLive 24.4.2. Get creative in the studio. Build mixes, loops, sound effects, and more, then bring them out to your show and mix them with the live performance. Process channels using your favorite plug-ins and completely automate your entire performance. StudioLive 24.4.2 revolutionizes music production, opening endless creative possibilities.

See it. Touch it. Change it: the ease of analog meets the power of digital.

Sit down at a StudioLive 24.4.2, and you see real hardware Mute and Solo buttons, trim controls, and clearly labeled, individual knobs for the parametric EQ and dynamics processing. The master section—complete with Talkback, Monitor, Cue, and a choice of headphone sources—looks just like the master section on an analog board but with far more power and flexibility. Aux sends have their own controls. Every channel has a big, bright meter display.

Bottom line: if you’ve ever used an analog mixer, you’ll be right at home with a StudioLive 24.4.2. And even if you’ve never used a mixer before, you’ll quickly be able to create quality mixes and recordings.

Why choose the StudioLive 24.4.2 rather than the StudioLive 16.4.2?

Let’s say you want more than 16 channels but want to keep your system compact. Perhaps the acts and events you mix require lots of monitor mixes, so you need more than the six auxiliary buses in the 16.4.2, and you want fully parametric EQ, rather than semi-parametric. You could use an enhanced gate with Key Listen and Key Filter features, and a Threshold control on the limiter would be handy. A stereo graphic EQ on the mains is mandatory but you also want graphic EQ on the subgroups and auxes at times—four dual-mono, 31-band graphic EQs would do the job nicely. No problem! You get all of these enhancements and more with the 24-channel, 10-aux, StudioLive 24.4.2.

A gigantic console in a small package thanks to the Fat Channel.

If StudioLive were an analog console, it would have 4-foot-long channel strips packed with knobs and buttons or it would require a massive outboard rack of expensive signal processors! That’s because each channel has its own studio-grade compressor, limiter, gate, 4-band parametric equalizer, and high-pass filter. In all, we’ve packed 43 compressors, 43 limiters, 43 gates, 24 high-pass filters, and more, into one remarkable Fat Channel.

Engaged by pressing any Select button, the StudioLive 24.4.2’s Fat Channel features extensive EQ and dynamics for every input channel, every aux output (including the two internal FX buses), every subgroup output, and the main outputs.

To let you get the most from all of this processing power without descending into menu purgatory, the Fat Channel is desgined with clearly labeled physical knobs; an ingenious, multi-function, 16-ladder LED display; an in-your-face Selected Channel display; and even a separate horizontal pan display. It’s easy to instantly access any function and get clear, visible feedback.

Not just effects. Effects you’d expect from a $600 stand-alone processor!

You get two programmable, 32-bit, stereo DSP effects engines, loaded with 50 reverbs, delays, and time-based effects that you can really use. The reverbs are so rich and detailed that you feel like you’re there. Delays are precise. Slap echo sounds like old-school tape effects. All 50 effects have easy-to-use parameter adjustment, tap tempo, store, recall, and Scene selection for ultimate creative flexibility.

The StudioLive 24.4.2’s 4 dual, 31-band graphic equalizers can be applied to the main, subgroup, and aux outputs so you can compensate for room acoustics, speaker response, and much more.

All of these features add up to a lot of settings to remember and reset at every performance. That’s where the power of digital comes in: StudioLive lets you save all of your digital settings for quick setup and recall. Save Scenes that include every setting on the mixer or save just the Fat Channel settings. Copy-and-paste settings across multiple channels. Save individual DSP effects for ultimate ease, speed, and control.

This means that for fixed applications like clubs, churches, and auditoriums, you can always count on the same sound and can fine-tune Scenes for different songs and call them up instantly. And it lets rank amateur volunteers successfully operate the StudioLive 24.4.2.

If you have a computer with 6-pin FireWire, you have a 26-track digital recorder instantly ready to capture your gig, church service, or presentation. Just two mouse clicks engages Capture™ recording software. Studio One Artist™ digital audio workstation lets you edit and enhance to your heart’s content.

StudioLive 24.4.2 features a tightly integrated FireWire interface that delivers up to 32 channels of recording and up to 26 channels of simultaneous playback. Each FireWire recording channel can be set to record either pre- or post-Fat Channel signal processing, delivering total flexibility and power.

Because StudioLive 24.4.2 can so easily return FireWire playback channels from your computer, you can pull off nifty tricks. You can soundcheck your band and fine-tune the P.A. in a new venue, even when the band’s not there yet. Or create backing tracks at your studio and seamlessly blend them with live performances.

Ease of use and powerful features only count if the sound quality is equally impressive. After all, it really comes down to how good those microphone preamps are, how clean the signal path is, and how well the algorithms perform. That’s why you should choose a digital mixer made by PreSonus, a company already famous for its analog mic preamps, pristine digital interfaces, and well-regarded signal processors.

XMAX™ Class A preamplifiers deliver more headroom, deeper lows, smoother highs, and a richer overall sound than the preamps found in competing mixers. Ultra-high-headroom, 32-bit floating-point processing is used for all digital mixing. All analog inputs and outputs use the highest quality digital converters available. Synchronization to your computer is stable and robust, thanks to JetPLL™ synchronization technology, resulting in great stereo separation and clear, transparent audio.

StudioLive expands with your input needs.

Need more than 24 channels for mixing live shows and don’t need to record? Daisy-chain two StudioLive 24.4.2s via their FireWire ports to get up to 48 input channels and 8 submix buses. If you need more than 24 channels for recording, and you don’t need a full channel strip for the additional inputs, you can daisy-chain a StudioLive 24.4.2 with a PreSonus FireStudio Project, FireStudio Tube, or FireStudio Mobile interface. It could not be simpler. Inside, it’s pure PreSonus.