Groups - Part 4 - VCAs and Mute Groups using the Soundcraft Ui24r 1 1 

This is Big Desktop mode. Found in your settings menu. Local - Big Desktop for mix. From there, you need to make sure to zoom your browser out enough to see everything and then you can choose several upper display options from the Ui menu button. It makes a huge difference in the Ui of this console. It's really excellent when set up like this. It will not work or work well on a small screen though.

I don't you can simultaneously ride makeup gain knobs

Lots of questions here and maybe watching my groups video will help a bit but some basic terminology is needed here. A VCA is just a remote control of multiple channels essentially. It passes no audio, just allows multiple channels to be turned up or down simultaneously. A group means we send audio to a stereo channel (the group) which is then typically sent to FOH. That group can be processed as a group so you could EQ the whole drum set for example. A Matrix is a feed that sends a mix of groups or your master LR unlike an aux which sends mixes made up of channels. Some more advanced boards will allow you to add individual channels to a matrix mix as well. So using a subgroup with a VCA is not at all uncommon. I’d recommend you set up some simple instances using these different concepts so that you can see them in action.

@@EaslerMedia yes, I am familiar with the concept of VCAs vs. Subgroups. My question was more leaning towards the subgroup affecting my levels to the the mains when I only need the subgroup for my Matrix mix. I typically group my channels with VCAs. This is my first go around with a Matrix mix. I.E. I want a L/R send for my Matrix mix but also want to perhaps mix it a little more vocals, instruments or drums for example. Do I unlink the subgroup from the mains to achieve this w/out affecting my FOH channel levels? I see that the UI24 gives me the option to unlink from master on my Matrix mix. I can also "Exclude" from master my subgroup. Do I need to do either or both (Exclude from Master for my Subgroup and or Unlink from Master my Matrix mix? I want complete and separate control for my Matrix mix entirely independent of my FOH mix with the added benefit of being able to add effects to my Subgroups. Of course I could set up my entire P.A. and experiment with excluding and unlinking. Just hoping someone has already done this before that could advise me the best route for what I'm trying to achieve.

@@CarlosDantana sorry for not answering this sooner and perhaps you already have the an answer by trying it. Removing a subgroup from the mains just means that it isn’t going to the mains through that group. You don’t need to do that to do what you want on your matrix mix. Your matrix mix is going to be a mix of any busses and whatever you do on your matrix will not have any effect on the mains. It is its own send.

Hi! You will just want to go to the settings wheel button and then Settings - Local - Big Desktop Mode for MIx - ON. You will need to zoom out on your browser until everything fits nicely.

@@EaslerMedia thank you very much!

That's because a sub is made up of channels that then gets sent to the mains. A sub is a post fade aux essentially and some mixers like Soundcraft si treat them just like that. So youre going channel - sub - send to main. The sub volume won't change the individual volume of your aux even if sent post fade because the channel is going to the aux before that signal goes to the sub. Hope that makes sense.

@@EaslerMedia it does make sense. With my old analog Mackey board I could disconnect my channels from the mains by pushing the l r button. is there a way to control the overall volume of a group of channels by assigning them to a sub group? I was able to do it with a VCA channel but I like the idea of being able to add eq to a group.

@@gerrigorlich4179 well your subgroup master should do just that

It doesn’t seem to. I don’t see way to add my subgroup channel to the aux channel I want it to go to. I guess I don’t really understand how subgroups are routed and if I need to change my mapping to get it to do what I want it to do. I have a Soundcraft ui not si.

Could you be more specific as to what you would like to do? You can send subgroups to an FX bus which many consoles actually do not do in this manner but you say you would like the return so I am guessing you mean a group for all of the FX - to turn all FX on/off? In this case you can use a VCA.

@@EaslerMedia There are many usage cases that need the fx returns to be routed through a group, for example having a drum mix with the room FX compressed together with the drum kit, which can not be done without being able to process the FX as well. Then there is only the old school GEQ on masters which is very slow and very granulated, I much often need the gentle PEQ on my masters to sculp the curve precisely and fast, but this device does not offer PEQ on masters for some strange reason so it is not possible to route everything through a group and then use its PEQ for additional processing. There is more, but really there is no logic in giving groups and not being able to use them fully, it costs nothing really. This way it seems like they do not want advanced users to use their devices.

@@BojanBojovic but you do have parametric EQ and compression on your sub groups and you can send the group to an fx bus. While the auxes have graphic EQ which I'm not a fan of, the subgroups do not.

@@EaslerMedia The problem is exactly that, when you put the whole drum kit through a group you can not add reverb or amp simulation as those would go to the whole drum kit, while the reverb goes only to snare and toms, amp simulation on snare as well. Being able to put the fx returns through the group fixes this and many other things. My idea was to use the group PEQ instead of master GEQ but this is possible only if I leave the FX returns unprocessed, which is not that bad but still there is no reason not to include this as an option for us who want to use it, not to mention PEQ on masters. It is a great mixer, much better and versatile then any analog mixer in the same price range, but this would cost them nothing to make. Not to mention that you can not separate left and right channel for the delay and set 10ms difference to get the stereo delay, for a Lexicon delay this is unforgivable.

​@@BojanBojovic I understand what you are saying - you want parallel processing so you can have an amped snare for example but you don't want the amped snare in the group? You could always double patch and have the amped snare in a drum vca but not group for example. You do have your channel fx send and the group fx send so there is a pretty good amount of flexibility. I would like parametric everywhere but I also remember that there are limitations on mixers costing much much more and I think there is a good balance of capability and user friendliness overall for a rather inexpensive mixer.