Allen & Heath ZED-24

The ZED-24 has a fantastic pedigree which comes from nearly 40 years of making mixing desks for the professional sound community. The audio circuitry is based on years of continual development and refinement and the performance of all the elements within the mixer has been perfected to ensure the very best sound possible.

This is a mixer for anyone, from entry-level to professionals, who appreciates fantastic sound, rugged build quality and imaginative feature sets. It'll be equally happy running your gig on stage, recording live or mixing down in your studio at home.

Allen & Heath has teamed up with major software supplier Cakewalk to bundle its SONAR LE music creation and audio production software with ZED, giving you a fantastic, high spec digital audio workstation.

The feature-set is incredibly advanced for a mixer at this level - it has 23 independent sources to the mix, 10 independent outputs, 4 aux sends, a USB send & return for PC or Mac recording, playback and effects, a unique dual stereo input capability and some very advanced monitoring facilities. In fact, ZED-24 is so packed full of great features that you'd think it would cost much, much more.

It can be used for many different tasks, whether in live performance, utilizing plug-in effects via USB, live recording via USB and Cakewalk, studio recording or mixing down to produce your own 2-track recordings.

What about the sound quality? Allen & Heath's chief designer, Mike Griffin, has been at the forefront of audio innovation for many years and has developed the designs for our spectacularly successful MixWizard and GL series professional live mixers. Mike is always striving to produce the best possible sound for Allen & Heath mixers, and for ZED has produced the 'DuoPre', a mic preamplifier which sounds as sweet as a nut, as pure as the driven snow. The DuoPre combines an optimised line input circuit together with the microphone preamp circuit so that it will not colour or distort your sound, will give you lots of headroom and give you a truly professional feel.

Features

• Inputs
  One of the great things about the ZED series is thenumber and variety of things you can plug in. In addition to the sixteen monochannels there are four stereo channels, each with a main stereo input on jacksockets, and with the ability to take additional stereo inputs from phonosockets or from the USB audio input, flexibility gives you control. In all,ZED-24 boasts 129 different controls on its front panel - way more than any ofthe competition! 16 mic/line channels are provided on ZED-24 - plenty for micsor DI boxes for larger bands or demanding applications requiring more inputsthan the ZED-14. 4 stereo line inputs, 3 with dual inputs. All inputs haveindependent gain control.
• DuoPre
  Based on the proven pre-amps from the hugely successfulPA series, the ZED series has new DuoPreTM pre-amps, which use a two stagedesign, with carefully controlled amounts of gain in each stage. Whenamplifying the signal from the XLR input, the gain range is huge - 69dB ofrange to be exact - and is very evenly distributed around the gain control,meaning better control of signal level. Most of the gain comes from the firststage, so unwanted noise is kept to a minimum. Line level signals are simplyplugged into the second stage of the pre-amp by using the line input jacksocket, which has the great advantage of less noise when using the line input.
• EQ section
  ZED-24 features a responsive 3-band, swept mid frequencydesign with MusiQ - optimised slope (or Q factor) for equalising individualinstruments. HF and LF also boast Xtra Boost giving you extra control.
• Auxiliary sends
  4 aux sends are provided, of which1&2 are prefade for foldback monitoring, and 3 & 4 post-fade foreffects sends. A stereo signal can be sent from auxes via USB to computer tocreate 2 separate record feeds independent of the main LR mix (1&2) and orused as FX sends (3&4).
• USB audio flexibility
  Getting audio to and from acomputer easily is now a common requirement for live sound and musicproduction. The way we have implemented this on ZED is super-flexible andsuper-easy! No longer do you need to fiddle around the back of your PC to getto the soundcard inputs, only to find that the levels are all wrong and noisy.Just plug in a USB lead to your ZED, select the USB routing on the mixer andthe device on your computer and that's it! Quality audio to and from your PCor Mac. Three switches provide different send/return configurations forrecording, playback and utilising external FX.
• Build
  At this level, most mixers are built using a single, flatPCB with all the pots and switches attached at right angles. ZED-24 utilisesindividual vertically mounted channel circuit boards with each rotary controlfixed with a metal nut to the front panel - making a much more robust productthat will resist damage and give years of reliable use. ZED also hasprofessional 100mm faders for ultimate control over your levels.
• SONAR LE - provided Free!
  We have teamed up withCakewalk to bundle SONAR LE with this ZED mixer. The two team up together inmany ways - for example straightforward recording of a stereo mix, recordingtracks individually to build up a song, or for inserting a SONAR LE effectsplug-in.

Other Features

• Insert points
• High pass filter
• Stereo imaging control on every channel
• Channel mute switches
• Stereo return
• 2-track return
• Advanced monitoring facilities
• 1/4" and 3.5mm headphone outputs
• Stereo record out
• Mono sum of LR output
• Main LR
• 12-bar LR meters
• Master controls for aux 1&2

Specifications

• Inputs
  Mono channel (XLR) Input +6 to –63dBu for nominal (+17dBu inmax)
  Mono channel Line Input (Jack socket) +10 to –26dBu (+30dBumax)
  Insert point (TRS Jack socket) 0dBu nominal +21dBu max.
  StereoInput (Jack sockets) 0dBu nominal (control = Off to +10dB)
  Stereo input (phono sockets) 0dBunominal (control = Off to +10dB)
• Outputs
  L, R & Mono Outputs (L&R XLR, Mono Jack) 0dBu nominal.+21dBu max.
  Aux Outputs (Jack sockets) 0dBu nominal. +21dBu max.
  AltOutputs (phono sockets) 0dBu nominal. +21dBu max.
  Rec Outputs (phono sockets) 0dBu nominal. +21dBu max.
• Frequency Response
  Mic in to Mix L/R Out, 30dB gain +0.5/-1dB 20Hz to20kHz.
  Line in to Mix L/R out 0dB gain +0.5/-1dB 10Hz to 30kHz
  Stereo in to Mix L/R out +0.5/-1dB 10Hz to 30kHz
• THD+n
  Mic in to Mix L/R Out, 0dB gain 1kHz +10dBu out 0.004%
  Mic into Mix L/R Out, 30dB gain 1kHz 0.014%
  Line in to Mix L/R out 0dB gain 0dBu1kHz 0.005%
  Stereo in to Mix L/R out 0dB gain+10dBu 1kHz 0.003%
• Headroom
  Analogue Headroom from nominal (0Vu) 21dB
  USB in & out headroom fromnominal (0Vu) 14dB
• USB Audio CODEC (Coder/Decoder)
  USB Audio In/Out USB 1.1 compliant16bit.
  Sample Rate 32, 44.1, or 48kHz
• Noise
  Mic Pre EIN @ max gain 150R input Z 22-22kHz -127dBu
  Mix L/R out, L/R faders = 0, 22-22kHz -84dBu
• Dimensions (H x W x D): 3.86" x 35.4" x 18.3"
• Weight: 23.1 lbs

TMGR# ZED-24