Mackie 1402VLZ4 Owner's Manual

Owner’

s Manual

This control gives you up

to 15 dB boost or cut above
12 kHz, and it is also flat  
at the detent. Use it to  
add sizzle to cymbals,  
and an overall sense of
transparency, or edge to
keyboards, vocals, guitar
and bacon frying. Turn it
down a little to reduce sibilance, or to hide tape hiss.

With EQ, you can also screw things up royally.  

We’ve designed a lot of boost and cut into each  
equalizer circuit, because we know everyone will  
occasionally need that. But if you max the EQs on  
every channel, you’ll get mix mush. Equalize subtly  
and use the left sides of the knobs (cut), as well as  
the right (boost). Very few gold-record-album engineers
ever use more than about 3 dB of EQ. If you need more
than that, there’s usually a better way to get it, such as
placing a mic differently (or using a different kind of
mic entirely).

These knobs allow you to tap a portion of each  

channel signal out to another source for parallel  
effects processing or stage monitoring. Aux send  
levels are controlled by these knobs and by the  
aux 1 master [40].

These are more than just effects and monitor sends.

They can be used to generate separate mixes for  
recording or “mix-minuses” for broadcast. By using  
aux 1 in the pre [39] mode, these mix levels can be
obtained independently of the channel’s level control.

Aux 1 in post mode and aux 2 are post-low cut,  

post-EQ and post-fader. That is, the sends obey the  
settings of these controls. Aux 1 in pre mode follows  
the EQ and low cut settings only. Pan and level (fader)
have no effect on the pre send (see diagram below).

Each aux send level ranges from off through unity

(the center detent position) on up to 15 dB of extra gain
(when turned fully clockwise). Chances are you’ll never
need this extra gain, but it’s nice to know it’s there if
you do.

Channel 7–14 aux pots control the mono sum of the

channel’s stereo signals for each aux send. For instance,
channel 7 (L) and 8 (R) mix together to feed that  
channel’s aux send knobs.

We recommend going into a stereo reverb in mono and

returning in stereo. We have found that on most “stereo”
reverbs the second input just ties up an extra aux send
and adds nothing to the sound. There are exceptions,
so feel free to try it both ways. If your effects device is
true stereo all the way through, use aux 1 to feed its left
input and aux 2 to feed the right input.

Still with us? Good for you. Here come the tricky

parts, the output or master section where the mixing is
really done. We have even started it on a new page: