Sound Devices MixPre-6 II One Year Later

1528 decibels of dynamic range

and when you consider the loudest sound

recorded is like 210 decibels

this thing has some serious dynamic

range

[Music]

hey guys it's randy and welcome back to

another video and today i'm going to

cover

everything that you need to know about

the sound devices mix pre-6 second

edition

before we get into that let's talk about

32-bit float recording because i'm sure

that's why the majority of you guys are

interested in this device so 32-bit

float of course as i mentioned at the

beginning is

massive dynamic range so it's big hey

why don't people

in athens like the morning i don't know

because dawn is tough on greece

[Laughter]

good one so what exactly is 32-bit float

well it's essentially recording a

massive amount of dynamic range like

1528

decibels of dynamic range you can

actually record someone speaking and

then a volcano erupting

without changing your gain at all which

is pretty crazy it still means you have

to set up your mics properly to get good

signal to noise ratio

but in terms of clipping you basically

don't have to worry about it

ever and holy crap we just passed 1 000

subscribers

you guys are absolutely nuts thank you

so much let's go ahead and take a look

at this thing

up here we've got our sound devices icon

that's basically our power indicator

to the right of that we've got this star

button which is a

programmable button i have it set up so

it does my sd card

it just jumps to that spot in the menu

that way i can format my cards quickly

you can also use it to slate and do some

other things beside that

play stop record pretty self-explanatory

below that we've got our four channel

controls these are linked to

xlr and quarter inch inputs one through

four on either side

and if you press them in you get some

additional features so it'll bring up

the actual menu itself you can arm

disarm low cut change the input all that

sort of stuff you'll see some of this is

grayed out

it's because i'm currently recording

with this and you can see it also glows

green while i'm speaking

if i push it a little harder check check

check hey hey hey hey

you can see that i make it actually go

yellow and i believe it goes right if it

clips too i think the limiters were

kicking on there

and then as you can see we've got our

screen over here one tap will get you to

view all the channels and then back to

just monitoring left and right

and for size comparison here's one of

these little guys that we all have

every audio guy in the world has one of

these great for daytime i've never had

an issue with it

these rings are actually kind of a

lifesaver just being able to quickly

glance over and see if you're clipping

or something like that so

i mount this right below my camera when

i'm recording youtube videos and it's

great because if i ever see yellow i

know i've clipped so

pretty nice to have that sort of

indicator always there all right so on

the left side here we've got our two

neutrik combo jacks beside that we've

got our usb a port

you can connect uh third-party

accessories like another keyboard

if you want to type in metadata quickly

or anything like that and it also allows

you to attach a usb

type a backup device so you can throw a

thumb drive on there

and record a backup one thing that's

important to note is that

it does require that you stop recording

before it backs up to that device so

in the event that you lose power or

something like that it's not going to

work for you as a backup but

just nice to know you do have some

additional storage there that you can

use

and as you can see here we've got our

usb type-c port this is how i'm powering

the device currently

there are a few different power options

on the back and i'll get to those in

just a sec

you can also use external power banks

that are usb type a

to see or you can use the included usb c

to c

cable and you're gonna use the usbc if

you're plugging into a computer as well

and down here we've got our unbalanced

stereo out this

is great for sending a mix to your

camera or to another recorder

and it's set up to default to output

what comes out of your left right mix

but you can't actually configure this to

come out any iso tracks or anything like

that so it's pretty handy you can build

your own mix essentially for

a camera in the top right corner here

we've got our power switch

it's pretty awesome that it's hard to

hit so it's buried in there you kind of

have to dig for it

and if you turn off power i'm actually

going to do that while i'm recording

right now

so i just flipped off the power and you

can see that you can still

hear me i should say you can hear that

you can still hear me so it does

actually maintain the power if you're in

record which is pretty sweet on the back

side here we've got our

plastic sound devices branded uh battery

sled

this is included with the device and

this holds four double a's

you can of course get herosie power

options you can get v-mount sleds that

slide onto here

so there are all types of different

power options if you want them i pretty

much always plug in through the wall so

i never really use this thing

just kind of covers up the back and then

inside here we've got a little allen

wrench this is actually just to

push through the device there's a hole

where this tripod goes in right beside

it

and it's going to push our quarter 20

thread out through the top so you can

mount a camera flush on the top of this

device

then inside here we have our sd card

which i can't really take out right now

because i'm currently recording to it

anti-rotational pin that just kind of

sits in here against this magnet

all right and last but certainly not

least we've got channels three and four

with our neutrik combo jack inputs

we have our aux or mic in this is a nice

stereo return

uh it's unbalanced 3.5 millimeter what's

awesome

about this is that you can actually

route this to channels five and six

so you do get six true channels of

recording versus the mix pre

three where this actually overwrites

channels

two and three on the device on the mix

pre-three you're kind of maxed out at

three channels this one you actually do

get a true six channels which is pretty

sweet

down below that we've got our camera

time code in micro hdmi

what's fantastic about this is not only

can you sync this device to your camera

but you can actually send recording

flags from your camera

so when you press record on the camera

this device will start recording as well

then we've got our output for headphones

over here there's a 3.5 millimeter

headphone jack this headphone amp

actually sounds fantastic

i find it to be much less harsh than the

zoom f6 series

after a long day of shooting you want

something that sounds nice and sweet and

i gotta say

the headphone amplifiers on this are

awesome this will default to control

your headphone volume at all times

unless you're in a menu that has like a

range like if you're controlling gain or

something like that

this will jump to a gain control but

generally speaking it's pretty much

always headphone control and there is a

button on here that you can press

as you can see this device packs some

serious punch but let's get into some of

the advanced features and

what makes this really stand out above

the competition so of course we

mentioned 32-bit float recording the

massive dynamic range

uh great for bag drop recording sessions

great because you don't need a redundant

anymore

typically on other devices you'd have to

burn a second channel as like a safety

you don't really need to do that because

there's no risk of clipping so those are

some of the advantages

and one other thing it's not really con

but definitely something to take into

consideration

if you send a signal to a camera that

camera also has to be 32-bit enabled to

receive that value

otherwise you're going to be clipping

your camera like crazy so just be

mindful if you're sending a signal

you're going to want to adjust those

levels

the second unreal feature that i'm so

stoked for with this unit is

analog limiters this is a feature that's

pretty standard in like hollywood level

equipment and i am so thankful that it's

creeped its way down into consumer

products

but basically the main advantage with

analog limiters is that

you're limiting the signal before it's

converted to digital analog limiters

typically were really expensive

something you wouldn't see in this price

point and i'm really stoked that

we have analog limiters in the mixed pre

series and

the third amazing feature of this device

is the wingman app

this is a companion app it's bluetooth

enabled

it's available on ios android and ipad

and what's fantastic about this

is you can see your levels there you can

change channel names

you can type in metadata all these

wonderful things you can't actually

control the gain

of each channel but it is nice to be

able to see them it's pretty cool

so what are the main disadvantages with

this device there are definitely a

couple

number one is there's no ability to

record a safety channel

as i mentioned with 32-bit float you

can't really clip so there's no need for

it

but if you're recording in 24-bit it

would be nice if they enabled the

ability

to add a safety channel that would have

been pretty nice the second thing is

there's only room for one

sd card i definitely wish there was a

backup sd just in case

the one becomes corrupt and maybe i lose

power or something like that and it

won't actually write to the usba

in time so it'd be nice to have two sd

card slots but it's not a huge deal

breaker for my workflow

and the last thing which is just kind of

an ergonomics weird build quality thing

is this whole taking the hex wrench out

of the back when you need to mount your

camera to the top of it it's super

inconvenient you can't just pull the

quarter 20 thread up and put it into the

camera

instead you have to take the sound

devices unit off of your tripod

take off the backing plate take off the

plastic on the back of the sound devices

unit

pull out the hex wrench poke it through

the hole on the underside of the device

which is going to pop up the little

spring-loaded quarter 20 thread

then carefully thread your camera on

then take the whole unit and thread it

back onto your backing plate

and then put it back on the tripod and

if you have cables

attached and everything rigged up ready

to go it's really difficult to do this

so

i definitely recommend uh you know if

you are using it on top of your camera

get like a quick release plate or

something that you can always leave on

top

of your sound devices unit and that way

you can just take your camera off nice

and easy

i don't know before we wrap up today's

video i just want to say a huge thank

you for everyone sticking around

the channel just passed 1 000

subscribers which is absolutely crazy

if you guys want to see more videos just

like this i'll link to my other nerdy

videos

right up here that's it for this week

we'll see you guys next time

you