Soundcraft MH3

[SamG269]

So at my sisters church they have this massive board. Sadly nobody knows how to run this board at the church. They have VERY limited knowledge. From what I was told. they hardly ever adjust the eq for any channel. They had an engineer come in and adjust everything for them and thats how they have decided to leave it.

Now then why the post? Well... Im not about to go say "hey, I can help" becuase I dont know how to run this board either. Looks pretty complicated, and also it looks like they dont want "help"... In other words they think they can handle it.

So I would just like to know what are the opinions on this board? Who has used it? And why does it look so complicated? From what I see the benefits is that for being an analog board it has very many ways of sending out feeds via aux groups etc.

And. If you had this board and wanted to get something else, what did you buy or what would you buy? And why?

[Brad Weber]

The MH3 is a very flexible console that was designed so that it could be used for FOH or monitor duty. It is quite full featured such as having 8 Groups, 12 auxes, a 12x4 matrix, 'sends on faders' swap mode, 8 mute groups, 8 VCA groups, LCR panning and even snapshot automation with MIDI control. It was available as 24, 32, 40, 48 or 56 mono inputs each also having 4 stereo inputs. Used MH3 consoles in very good condition look to be $10k to $15k on eBay, around half what they were new.

It sounds like they are not taking advantage of what their console can do but unless they need greater I/O or have some other specific issue with it, the only reason I see considering something else from a technical or performance perspective might be to gain onboard processing, but even that may depend on what outboard processing they already have. From an operational perspective I guess the question might be if a less full featured, less flexible and thus simpler console would actually change how they mix and it sounds like it might have to be a big difference for it to have any significant impact in that sense.

[waynehoskins]

I've never used an MH, but I remember them being comparable to A&H's ML series, an excellent LCR, VCA, etc. console. These made their home in installed sound in the early 2000s, in the era when the PM4K was the king of the tours and even in the early years of the PM5D on the road (as the 5D was brand new and expensive).

My old church put in an ML5K when it was new, and it was great. Large format, plenty of I/O, and one of the first consoles I'd seen with a decent number of stereo auxes to accommodate IEMs. They replaced it this past year, after a decade of service, with a Heritage 4K, also a beautiful console.

My gut feeling is that the only useful upgrade from that class of console -- large format flagship LCR/VCA analog -- is to a large-format flagship digital console like the PM5D, Digidesign, or Digico offerings.

A large-format analog console isn't something a "normal" person will be familiar with, especially a flagship series. At the time, the MH3 was second-in-line at Soundcraft to the MH4 (and the MH2 was below it). It would be very familiar to a pro. It sounds like they either need to invest in some training or hire a pro, if not both.

[SamG269]

Originally Posted by Brad Weber

The MH3 is a very flexible console that was designed so that it could be used for FOH or monitor duty. It is quite full featured such as having 8 Groups, 12 auxes, a 12x4 matrix, 'sends on faders' swap mode, 8 mute groups, 8 VCA groups, LCR panning and even snapshot automation with MIDI control. It was available as 24, 32, 40, 48 or 56 mono inputs each also having 4 stereo inputs. Used MH3 consoles in very good condition look to be $10k to $15k on eBay, around half what they were new.

The sends on faders. How would that work? The faders aren't automated correct? So when you swap you'd have to adjust everything manually right?

And what are VCA groups? I've read up a little on them. But still dont understand the difference between regular groups and VCA groups, and the benefits.

Also (sorry for the questions) LCR? What is that? 3 main sends?

Originally Posted by waynehoskins

I've never used an MH, but I remember them being comparable to A&H's ML series, an excellent LCR, VCA, etc. console. These made their home in installed sound in the early 2000s, in the era when the PM4K was the king of the tours and even in the early years of the PM5D on the road (as the 5D was brand new and expensive).

So aside from being massive its also "old"? And this would be a mixer that can be used EITHER FOH or monitor. So with all the extra sends from the board my sisters church is obviously using both. But I dont think in the best way.. They also use Aviom...

But with so many outs would aviom even be necessary? Its only.. 3 guitars, drums( ), bass, 2 pianos, a chorus, and 6 back-up singers with mics. And the back up singers use floor monitors. Like 8 of them. But they are being fed the same thing.

I agree. they need training or hire a pro.

[waynehoskins]

The major functional difference between audio groups and VCA groups is that VCA groups work in an inhibitive (subtractive) manner, while audio groups are pile-on (additive), to borrow lightingspeak. That is, if you assign a channel to two audio groups, and turn both up, they add, you get twice the signal but only at the group level; turn one off and you get the original signal level. Assign it to two VCAs and set them both at unity and you get the original level at the channel level; turn one off and you get nothing at the channel fader level. It's like having up to 8 faders in series before the main channel fader. You could assign the entire band to one, and then subsections of the band to others.

LCR panning is true Left-Center-Right, three main outputs for L, C, and R speaker systems that each cover the entire space. It's stereo done right. With LR, if you pan something "center", it's panned equally to L and R. With LCR, you can pan true center so it comes out the C array only; it actually comes from straight in front of everyone, not both their left and right. A pretty common mixing technique is to pan vocals and speech C and the band LR.

As to dual-function consoles, they can usually work well in hybrid (monitors-from-FOH) situations. The name is a throwback to an even older time, before the mid-'90s, when there were FOH-only consoles and monitor-only consoles of the same series, each having a feature set specifically geared one way or the other. The first dual-function consoles were pretty revolutionary, having the high output count you need on a monitor board as well as the grouping and panning you want on a FOH board, usually with the master section controls re-assignable, so the same console can be configured for FOH, monitors, or hybrid.

My experience with Aviom systems is they're no substitute for a monitor engineer. They take a limited number of system-wide inputs and force the musician to adjust his own mix. Since your sister's church doesn't have an engineer, that's probably the best monitoring solution for now; once they do get an engineer, they can get even better results without the Aviom.

[SamG269]

Originally Posted by waynehoskins

The major functional difference between audio groups and VCA groups is that VCA groups work in an inhibitive (subtractive) manner, while audio groups are pile-on (additive), to borrow lightingspeak. That is, if you assign a channel to two audio groups, and turn both up, they add, you get twice the signal but only at the group level; turn one off and you get the original signal level. Assign it to two VCAs and set them both at unity and you get the original level at the channel level; turn one off and you get nothing at the channel fader level. It's like having up to 8 faders in series before the main channel fader. You could assign the entire band to one, and then subsections of the band to others.

So let me get this right... For example, in laymens terms. lol Groups when you add 2 channels together would equal "4" volume wise? But with VCA adding 2 channels would equal "2" volume wise. And in other words. Using VCA would "control' lets say 5 mics at the same time with respect to the levels they are at for each channel fader. Fader 1 is set at -5db. as well as 2,3,4, but channel 5 is -10 db. So when I adjust the VCA for those 5 mics they go up at the same levels they are at orinignaly? And down accordingly?...... Did I just confuse myself? I think I did.

[Brad Weber]

A VCA group is essentially a remote control for the faders. On a console with VCA control instead of the channel faders directly controlling the audio level the faders control the level of electronics that then control the audio level. What a VCA does it lets a single VCA Group fader then adjust the control level for multiple channels. So while adjusting the level of a Group is adjusting the overall signal level after everything assigned to that group is combined and affects only that mix, adjusting a VCA Group would actually adjust the level of the individual channels and affect any post-fader assignments.

An example of how one might use this would be to put the toms on one VCA, all the drums on another VCA and the praise band on a Group. You could then adjust the overall level of the praise band, process it, etc. via the Group. However, you could also adjust the level of the drums without affecting anything else via the one VCA and the level of the toms without affecting anything else including the rest of the drums via the other VCA.


Because the MH3 does not have fader automation, the snapshots are limited to mute status and VCA assignments. So in retrospect, the term "snapshot automation" in those days had a much different application that it probably is perceived as having based on what people have come to expect with digital consoles.

The "sends on faders" swap function lets you assign 8 Aux sends to the faders, meters and inserts normally assigned to the Groups and 'swaps' the Groups on to the 8 rotary controls normally used for the Aux masters. Thus it provides greater control and monitoring as well as the ability to insert outboard processing for the Aux sends when mixing monitors from the console. This is not an either FOH or monitor situation, it can do both at once and you simply select which mode works best for that particular application.

Perhaps one can think of consoles like the MH3 this way, they were a step between traditional analog and modern digital consoles that tried to incorporate additional flexibility and functionality. However, because they were analog, much of the setup and configuration that may be 'behind the scenes' to the average operator of a digital console is right there on the console. Think of many of the console configuration decisions made in software for a digital console having to be made via buttons and knobs on the console itself. It's not that the digital console is necessarily simpler to operate than an analog console like this, however there is more of the setup that may be hidden from the casual operator.

[SamG269]

Thanks for the explanation. I understand now the differences and how the board works compared to smaller and digitial boards. Really appreciate the responses.

Originally Posted by waynehoskins

My gut feeling is that the only useful upgrade from that class of console -- large format flagship LCR/VCA analog -- is to a large-format flagship digital console like the PM5D, Digidesign, or Digico offerings.

I agree it would be a good match... But only if they were actually using all of those channels. Currently I can see they only use maybe 30 channels. If that.

[waynehoskins]

Say the channel 1 fader is at -10. If no groups or VCAs are involved, then the channel level is -10 going into both the main faders and the post-fade aux controls. That's straightforward of course.

If it's routed to a group and the group is at -10, then it's at -10 going into the group faders but -20 into the main faders, but still -10 going into the post auxes.

If it's routed to two groups, both at -10, then it's still at -10 (from the channel fader) into the post auxes and the group faders, but now something like -17 into the main faders, because the two -20 and -20 groups add to produce more than either of them individually.

If we use only one VCA that's at -10, with the channel fader still at -10, then the channel level is -20 going into the post auxes and main faders.

If we add a second VCA that's at 0, the same levels remain. If we drop the second VCA to also -10, then the channel level is -30 going into the post auxes and main faders.

And similarly, if we turn the second VCA to -inf, the channel is at -inf no matter what else we do. And on a board with VCA mutes, if we mute one of the VCAs, it most likely mutes the channel.

Clear as mud?

VCAs changed the way we think about group mixing, and in fact in the last few years I've stopped mixing with groups most of the time. For rock and roll, it doesn't largely make sense; it's just as easy, and probably better, to mix with the channel faders, to always be mindful of how everything is; group mixing can encourage lazy mixing. VCAs let you preserve complex routing and panning of channels, taking that fader-grouping task away from audio groups, allowing groups to be used for collective processing or for composing matrixes or multitracking.

[SamG269]

I figure with what they are using they could easily switch to a MCL7. ?

[Brad Weber]

Originally Posted by SamG269

I figure with what they are using they could easily switch to a MCL7. ?

It sounds like it may be a matter of two general considerations, what they actually need and what they would actually use. Considerations such as the number and types of inputs, outputs, mix buses, etc. relate to the first area. Considerations such as the control directly available, the user interface and so on relate to the second aspect. It looks like a M7CL would potentially provide most of the same functionality and capability as well as adding onboard effects and processing as well as full scene functionality. However, whether they would be any more comfortable with that or tend to mix more with it is unknown.

[waynehoskins]

A valuable key bit of insight would be why they got an MH3 in the first place. Perhaps they had an engineer in the past but no longer do. Perhaps they had or anticipated growth in terms of I/O requirements where the features of a flagship-class board would be necessary or beneficial. Perhaps that class of board was recommended by a consultant or designer, and it was put in without much consideration for its relative complexity. Perhaps accommodating A- or B-list tours was a consideration. The list could go on.

As I understand it now, they don't have an engineer familiar with some of the most basic aspects like channel EQ. Might it be set-and-leave, without an engineer at all, or at most a button-pusher? In any case, I see little benefit to crossgrading to a midrange digital console like an M7. Sure, the M7 has automation, scene recall, that would allow someone to set up various combinations of settings and a minimally-skilled board op to babysit it and press the Go button; but setting all that up would appear to take more knowledge than they have, and the very different user interface would probably be far more daunting, not that it's really much more complicated at all, but because it's unfamiliar.