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<blockquote data-quote="Jay Ashworth" data-source="post: 138910" data-attributes="member: 8260">Re: X32 DiscussionLet me recap, just quickly, how effects work (and hopefully, I won&#039;t&nbsp; myself screw it up), and hopefully it will help you get a handle on&nbsp; this.&nbsp; Some to most of this, you may already know.On a sound board, effects can be used in two ways -- the effects themselves fall into two categories: There&nbsp; are effects, like compressors, eq, and such, which are &quot;series&quot;&nbsp; effects: because of how they work, you have to patch them into a channel&nbsp; insert point, and they only affect that one channel (or bus).Other&nbsp; effects, like reverb, are &quot;parallel&quot; effects; you can feed a collection&nbsp; of sources or busses all into the same effect strip if you want them&nbsp; all to have the same effect applied to them.&nbsp; These are generally fed&nbsp; from a bus or &quot;send&quot; on the board, and their output returns ...&nbsp; *somewhere* so you can route it to the mains.On the x32, you have 8 stereo effects slots.All 8 can be inserted into an insert point in some channel or bus.The&nbsp; 4 on the left, 1-4, can also be used as parallel or &quot;side-chain&quot;&nbsp; effects, where a bus feeds their input, and the output returns on the&nbsp; right half of Page 3 of the left/inputs side of the desk.When&nbsp; you use them this way, each channel&#039;s feed to the effect is controlled&nbsp; by the Send 1-8 knobs for that channel, the master send to the effect is&nbsp; the Bus 1-8 masters on Page 2 of the right side of the desk, and the&nbsp; outputs of those effects return, as noted above, as faders on the left&nbsp; side of the desk, in the same place that the channel inputs come in.&nbsp; (Traditional small desks had few to no dedicated returns for your&nbsp; effects, and if they did, they didn&#039;t have full input-strip control.)So&nbsp; that Page 3 &quot;Effects Return&quot; bank is the master return level for the&nbsp; signal coming out of the effects units; if those faders are down, you&nbsp; won&#039;t hear your effects.&nbsp; It&#039;s possible that if you set an insert point&nbsp; on those channels, the board will mute the returns to prevent feedback,&nbsp; though I haven&#039;t tested that.I wouldn&#039;t expect it to affect your noise floor, though.To&nbsp; address your earlier question: It is likely that the output gain&nbsp; control is all digital, in the signal presented to the DAC, yes.&nbsp; If&nbsp; that&#039;s the contributing factor to your noise, either your x32 has a&nbsp; hardware problem, or your input gain on the power amps is *way* too high&nbsp; -- and if it needs to be that high, it&#039;s possible you&#039;re not running&nbsp; the desk hot enough.I&#039;m not sure how new you are to mixing live&nbsp; sound from your posts, Daniel, but you may simply be not doing your&nbsp; gain-staging properly.&nbsp; Generally, you want to turn your mains up just a&nbsp; couple clicks, feed a signal to the board that comes up about, say, -18&nbsp; to -12 average by adjusting the channel gain/pad, then adjust the&nbsp; channel to Unity along with any intermediate busses and the master, and&nbsp; then adjust the amp gains to a good listening level.You want as much level (into and) out of the board as you can get without clipping, to improve S/N.Generally,&nbsp; if you can hear hiss out of the power amps, it&#039;s cause your amp gains&nbsp; are too high, and -- if they have to be that high -- cause you&#039;re&nbsp; level-short earlier in the signal chain.(If anyone thinks I&#039;ve glossed over anything material there, feel free to chime in; I am, after all, JV. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":-)" title="Smile&nbsp; &nbsp; :-)"&nbsp; data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":-)" /></blockquote>

[QUOTE="Jay Ashworth, post: 138910, member: 8260"] Re: X32 Discussion Let me recap, just quickly, how effects work (and hopefully, I won't myself screw it up), and hopefully it will help you get a handle on this. Some to most of this, you may already know. On a sound board, effects can be used in two ways -- the effects themselves fall into two categories: There are effects, like compressors, eq, and such, which are "series" effects: because of how they work, you have to patch them into a channel insert point, and they only affect that one channel (or bus). Other effects, like reverb, are "parallel" effects; you can feed a collection of sources or busses all into the same effect strip if you want them all to have the same effect applied to them. These are generally fed from a bus or "send" on the board, and their output returns ... *somewhere* so you can route it to the mains. On the x32, you have 8 stereo effects slots. All 8 can be inserted into an insert point in some channel or bus. The 4 on the left, 1-4, can also be used as parallel or "side-chain" effects, where a bus feeds their input, and the output returns on the right half of Page 3 of the left/inputs side of the desk. When you use them this way, each channel's feed to the effect is controlled by the Send 1-8 knobs for that channel, the master send to the effect is the Bus 1-8 masters on Page 2 of the right side of the desk, and the outputs of those effects return, as noted above, as faders on the left side of the desk, in the same place that the channel inputs come in. (Traditional small desks had few to no dedicated returns for your effects, and if they did, they didn't have full input-strip control.) So that Page 3 "Effects Return" bank is the master return level for the signal coming out of the effects units; if those faders are down, you won't hear your effects. It's possible that if you set an insert point on those channels, the board will mute the returns to prevent feedback, though I haven't tested that. I wouldn't expect it to affect your noise floor, though. To address your earlier question: It is likely that the output gain control is all digital, in the signal presented to the DAC, yes. If that's the contributing factor to your noise, either your x32 has a hardware problem, or your input gain on the power amps is *way* too high -- and if it needs to be that high, it's possible you're not running the desk hot enough. I'm not sure how new you are to mixing live sound from your posts, Daniel, but you may simply be not doing your gain-staging properly. Generally, you want to turn your mains up just a couple clicks, feed a signal to the board that comes up about, say, -18 to -12 average by adjusting the channel gain/pad, then adjust the channel to Unity along with any intermediate busses and the master, and then adjust the amp gains to a good listening level. You want as much level (into and) out of the board as you can get without clipping, to improve S/N. Generally, if you can hear hiss out of the power amps, it's cause your amp gains are too high, and -- if they have to be that high -- cause you're level-short earlier in the signal chain. (If anyone thinks I've glossed over anything material there, feel free to chime in; I am, after all, JV. :-) [/QUOTE]

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