Notepad-12FX Small-Format Analog Mixing Console with Usb I/O and Lexicon Effects

Buying a USB audio interface is a bit of a nightmare process for me - I look at signal to noise, dynamic range, and inputs and go crazy wishing Firewire still existed, or Thunderbolt 1/2 hadn't changed format to USB-C meaning those dedicated, high-speed interfaces had remained worth developing for. Eventually, I end up choosing something I'm not happy with, and the process starts again. So this time, I saw the Notepad 12FX's 4-in, 4-out and just went for it. At £119 it's not much more than average 2x2 interfaces or cheaper 4x4 ones anyway, and I don't record over 48KHz so for all the extra dynamic range those high-end interfaces can capture, I'm wasting money anyway. Usually I'd have gone for an eight or ten-channel 1U rackmount to solve the issue of plugging in more kit, with the computer having to act as a mixer (no DAW or loopback mode, no jamming!) and so forth, for three to four times the cost. So the Notepad's actually a brilliant choice. You can hook up guitar, mic, synths - just play like any mixer. The effects are decent but limited. Time to record? Inputs 1&2 are hardwired to USB 1&2, pre-channel strip, post gain. USB inputs 3+4 can be routed to input audio from 3&4, 5&6 or 7&8, or the main mix. As with 1&2, recording 3&4 bypasses the channel strip and is dry, post-gain; the stereo inputs don't have any EQ to apply. These settings aren't persistent, so you need to set up each time to power the mixer on and off. Main mix means if you're monitoring through channels 9&10, you'll get double/phasing/loopback - but that's okay, 'cause you can route your DAW to USB outputs 3&4, assign those to the headphones and use those for monitoring with their own level control too. You need to record main mix from USB channels 3&4 to record the EQs and effects. It's not unduly noisy, the latency is acceptable, and it's 24-bit, 44.1KHz or 48KHz. No fancy ADAT or S/PDIF, just straightforward analogue hookup. It can auto-duck incoming channels for selected mic inputs if you're mixing and podcasting live, but I haven't tried or needed that feature. Build quality is good, and it's not particularly bulky - see pictures to compare to a Novation Circuit. Downsides, you need to use their app to swap input channels - why not just use a switch, Soundcraft! There's space! There's no phantom power switch, it's always on - so watch out for duff XLR cables. And there's no power switch, but I don't think the Mac takes too kindly to it being present/removed lots on USB anyway, so any switch would have to leave the USB part live. Power supply is a nice soap-on-a-rope with an easy cable loop. Honestly, on paper the specs sound limiting, but for the price, this is a way more versatile option than a typical 4x4 USB audio interface (which will set you back about the same price) with no downsides unless you're recording the very highest-end audio. For home studios, jamming and hobbyists it's brilliant. Get this if you love playing music and aren't trying to do serious studio production at home - you can hook up more instruments, record like a four-track, and the quality is better than most people's ears can detect anyway. Particularly once you've mixed and made your MP3s...

First I scoured the negative reviews to decide whether or not to try this mixer. I found a few issues that had been highlighted. 1. The latency issues 2. The drivers on windows 10 3. Whether or not you can record 4 mics using as an interface. 1. Latency. This was important to me. I DI guitar and bass occasionally and latency drives me mental. Once I had the drivers installed the first reading was 22/30ms... Which isn't good. I went into the drivers control panel and put it on low latency and it now reads 5.2ms/5.2ms. This is much better! It does suffer a few little blips but nothing that isn't manageable and it can be reverted once tracking is done, awesome! 2. Drivers. This was a little trickier but I was aware of this prior to purchase. The drivers are not digitally signed so win10 hates them. You can temporarily disable digital signatures but upon reboot they won't work. If you go into advanced boot settings it is possible to change the boot option, disable safe boot mode, and permanently turn off digital signatures. I have since rebooted and everything is hunky dory. 3. Mic inputs as interface. The notepad 12fx definitely allows for 4 channels simultaneous recording. The other models do not. I have yet to truly test this but i/o configuration shows 4 inputs available. I purchased this mixer for home/portable studio recording mainly, which it seems perfect for. Its a massive upgrade from my line6 ux2 and seems to work great. It does need its own power which is something to consider but not really an issue. The size is fantastic and is easy to move around. I also wanted this as an analogue stand alone mixer for live use (solo work and maybe starting an open mic/jam night). Although I have not tested it yet with my active speakers I reckon it will work well. I thought I'd post this to help a few people struggling with the decision as I did, I am very pleased with this mixer for an incredible price!

For my particular needs as a home music experimenter this has been a great little unit. The quantity and variety of input and routing options has covered all my needs and it's solidly constructed. Built-in effects are handy and good quality (if a little limited compared with what you get in a pure purpose made effects unit). For the price it feels like you get a heck of a lot. Main snag has been that the first unit I received died after 6 months use. This seems to have been an internal fault in the unit itself, not a power supply failure. Amazon very swiftly replaced it with a new unit so I'm still happy but I'm flagging this up in case it happens to others (also it's the reason for dropping the rating from 5 to 4 stars). When I first got it there were some difficulties with using it in conjunction with Windows 10 (it was supposedly compatible but required workarounds for driver signing issues). However, as of mid-2020, updated firmware (v.2.04) seems to have addressed this.

I bought this to plug in my Nord piano and a condenser microphone and then to sing and play together with headphones plugged in, and for this, its fantastic. The headphone driver powers my headphones very loud! - so loud it will hurt your ears if you turn it more than 70% up. It has a DC power in with the cable and adapter supplied, there's no power switch, I just leave mine on all the time, there's also no Phantom power for the microphone, but I leave mine on at the time. The first 4 inputs are sockets which will take either a quarter inch Jack plug or a male XLR plug. Its great that these sockets are dual purpose because it saves space, its a shame that the main outputs don't do the same, theres on a female XLR socket option - no Jack or Phone out to send to your amplifier or main mix. - So you will have to buy an XLR cable for this. I haven't tried this yet as I don't use it to power an amplifier. The in built echo and chorus is good, I have no idea what the delay is for and its really not needed for me. Each channels Aux Send (Blue) knobs act as an effects level - so ideal for controlling reverb. You cannot use chorus for the keyboard channel and the reverb for the microphone. You can only control all effects at once. You can have reverb and chorus on at the same time if you want, but what for? The USB digital out is very good. It takes a lot of messing around with your computer to get it working though. I use it with a Windows laptop and I tried Audacity and I downloaded the Soundcraft driver from their website which installs and works perfectly. The only trouble with Audacity is that it will only work with two channels at once. So I could record the keyboard in stereo, but not the microphone at the same time, so it would need two takes, which ruined the performance to be honest. So, I turned to Cubase, I got a 30 day free trial and had all sorts of trouble getting it working, it kept coming up with ASIO recording not working or something like that. In the end I fixed it by uninstalling Audacity and doing a cold restart. After that all worked perfectly, except there was a little bit of a delay in the recording playback from the Cubase and the new track I was going to record live. To fix this, just go into the soundcraft driver control panel (double click the icon on your desktop once its installed) and change the buffer. Its set at 512 at the start, change it to 128 and you will find the delay of 12ms changes to 2ms which is much better. So, I am very pleased with this, and would recommend it to anyone, there is no hum and no hiss unless you turn up the gain to nearly max and you wouldnt need to do that if your source instrument is set up properly. Oh, another gripe, the feet are an unusual shape and so close to the edge of the unit that it will only fit onto something that is at least as big as it is. My keyboard is unfortunately a bit too small, so I had to wedge some bubble wrap underneath to protect my keyboard. I had a Mackie mixer before and I would say both are a similar quality, the USB 4 track input / output on this is very good value though for the money.

I decided to post a fair review with the pros and cons of this mixer before I returned it. This was due to USB capabilities I needed and expected, but hopefully you will find this review helpful enough to help you decide if this mixer is for you. I had high expectations due to already owning a powered soundcraft mixer but this mixer is missing some important features for me. Pros: - Solid construction - Layout works for me with a colour coded system for controls - Effects are simple but sound really nice, ideal for getting setup quickly - Plenty of channels for a small mixer - USB return capabilities are impressive, this saves time taking headphones on and off. - Low noise on inputs, only starts to get noisy at high gain - XLR outputs, a lot of smaller desks don’t feature these and instead go for jack outputs. Cons - USB interface is not flexible enough for me, by default inputs 1&2 are sent over usb dry (without effects). This is no good if you are looking to connect this mixer to an iPhone for live streaming. This is really disappointing not to have a control on the mixer to toggle this on and off. Apparently this can be altered via drivers on a computer to pass FX, but I believe it doesn’t remember the choice when powered down, or other devices connected. - No separate power switch, pull cable out to power down. This is not tragic but doesn’t feel right. Over time, this may damage the cable. - No phantom power switch which means 48V power is constantly being fed to the desk inputs. This has the potential to damage some mics. - Even when the desk had been zeroed, placing leads into the desk produced a clunk through the headphones. - No foot switch for effects on/off - Aux and FX are under the same control knob. Overall, the mixer produces a really nice sound and I would of been more than happy to keep it if the USB had more flexibility and the phantom power switch was present. Hopefully you found my review helpful 🙂

As can be seen in the pictures, this item arrived damaged, the box has clearly been dropped or had something poke through it... I am very unhappy with this service!

Excellent piece of kit, microphone effects are great. Highly recommended at this price point.

So many mixers, so many options… But this hits the sweet spot in the areas that really count! It’s well made and attractive, simple to use because it’s been designed by somebody who cares and best of all it sounds fabulous. Fabulously silent that is, no hiss or pops when working or being adjusted, but the sound from your speakers will be well pre-amplified and crystal clear! Sound effects are not the usual jumble of nonsense, just three individual effects plus the ability to link any or all of them just by touching the button, then dialling in the strength. What a breath of fresh air compared to the meaningless drivel on most other mixers! It just works. What else matters!? Well how about Neutrik sockets, nice long power lead with a tiny power supply, well marked rotary dials and a slide control for master volume, it’s got just the right connectivity too. And all at a price that undercuts anything at this quality level.

Lo uso para trabajar pero ha venido sin transformador que es un poco especial y ahora que hago lo de devuelvo des astre quien haya revisado el producto

J ai acheté ce produit mais apres 4 jours de test pour mes prestation musicale. Le produit ne m a pas rendu satisfait sur la qualité accoustique ni pour les chants. Il n y a pas de bouton on/off pas pratique car branchement direct avec le cable; parfois de legere eteincelle. En plus pas de bouton mute des entree et donc meme si je baisse le volume des entree ms a zero…le micro filaire branché fonctionne malgré. Du coup j ai retourné le produit. Dommage car les tutos sur le produit paraissait bien mais…non en realité, pour une prestation exterieur. Peut parfaitement comvenir pour un usage a la maison.

Preso nella formula usato come nuovo è stato un grande affare!! Ottimo mixer( peccato per la mancanza dell'equalizzazione e del fader del canale 9/10 dove c'è l'Usb) Che da poca possibilità di gestione del suono e la mancanza per me un po' più grave di un led di notifica accensione.... Aggiornamento: Purtroppo in seguito ho scoperto che la gestione singola dei canali 7/8 in cuffia non aveva la possibilità di essere separata in maniera indipendente e ho dovuto fare il reso... Resto comunque un ottimo mixer per chi non ha questa necessità specifica

I was looking to add a karaoke setup to my existing home theater system, and did a bunch of research on mixers that offer the features and sound quality without breaking the bank. The others I considered were the Yamaha MG06X and the Soundcraft Notepad-8FX (the younger sibling to this mixer.) I chose the 12FX for its solid set feature set, enabling more than adequate karaoke performance while leaving room for expansion for when my talented musician friends come over and want to jam. The 4 x combo XLR / TRS inputs, 6 x TRS sockets, and dual RCA ins make for a versatile setup for mixing a range of instrumentation, voice, and analog audio inputs. The USB interface is perfect for recording to your computer, and the on-board effects generator make is possible to dial in just the right level of 'environment' to your voice (but turn it too high and it'll sound cheesy). Bummer the device doesn't have an on/off switch though, but the Soundcraft Notepad-12FX is otherwise a solid little device -- strongly recommended.

This is one of the best mixer for small jamming. the vocal clarity and effect simply aswome.