At the NAB (National Association of Broadcasters) show this past April, Digico announced a new digital audio mixer in their product line that brings the company's processing power and flexibility into a price range that most churches can reach. Based on a brief hands-on at the NAB Show and available preliminary information, let's take a quick tour what we're seeing touted by Digico about this console.
The Digico S21 is scheduled to sell for under $7,000. While we don't have an exact release date, we're told the S21 will begin shipping very soon. We're told it offers many integration options with dual DMI (Digico Multichannel Interface) card slots. Cards for several protocols are available, including a Dante card and an Aviom A-Net card—two protocols very popular in the church market. USB connectivity will deliver 48 channels of audio for recording with a digital audio workstation. And for analog support, 24 mic inputs are built in, with 12 analog outputs for your main and monitor mixes. 96 kHz sample rate is the standard in the new S21.
Two touch-screens are standard, and provide multi-touch support for setting parameters. For example, you can set EQ curves by dragging band center points across the frequency band and up and down in gain on the screen, and using familiar “pinch and unpinch” two-finger motions to change the Q bandwidth. Other effects can be manipulated in a similar fashion. However, knobs are still available by which one can adjust fixture parameters. This allows for more granular control of the parameters.
The Digico S21 retains many of the features of the larger Digico consoles at the new price point. Four layers of Channel Banks allow you to group ten faders representing any combination of input channels, aux sends, groups, control groups and matrixes, creating a custom control surface that gives you great flexibility. You could have one group for your main praise band mixing elements; another for your drama group; another for the sermon section that perhaps brings together your pastor's wireless, video playback levels for sermon illustrations, and the recording aux send.
Color coding of channels on the screens helps to quickly identify which are input channels, aux sends, and groups. Digico also has a HTL (hidden until lit) feature, where if something isn't in use it is greyed out or hidden, and the light ring that is placed around each encoder knob changes color based on its current function.
The company is touting a “flat design” to the screen user interface, which is the latest trend in web UI design. However, I question whether it'll actually make the UI easier to use. In flat design, labels and buttons often look the same, which I think would create some confusion, not reduce it.
There's also no mention of being able to control the mixer through smartphone or tablet apps, which would be disappointing.
However, the power of the console looks like its excellent for the house-of-worship market, and the ability to rearrange channels to fit your needs and mixing style is a powerful feature. Digico has a strong reputation in the high-end audio mixer market, and it will be interesting to see what the buzz is as installations of the S21 take place.
