emusonacid!

Thanks tarelizer i want that very same Mackie amp distortion/eq and able to dub my songs on the cheap. I need a cheap little console now, waiting the day i can afford a 328XD.
I like the edge the Mackies gives to everything at resamling/EQing.

I had a GS3000 that sounded good pushing the master with its high headroom, but at distorting it was crap. The sound of a preamp badly breaking . Talking old Soundscraft, i had a Series One S had, not much headroom and no distortion comparable to Mackies.

Anyway i will not buy a large analog console like a Ghost now, first i don't have the dough. And i will put my money in that 328XD.

Why dont buy a cheap tascam or mackie vlz??

i found a 1604 vlz pro a while back and it does sound quite nice when you overdrive the preamp. especially sending the direct out to the adjacent channel to eq the distortion further. however, i was able to achieve similar effects with cheap behringer mixers (like the ub502 which you can find for $30 or less used) except you cant do the direct out eq. i've read that while the vlz-808 combo is the best for early 00s dnb the CR1604 is also equally good and has a grungier distortion when overdriven. as far as new stuff i believe it may just have to do with the noise floor and headroom. newer mixers like the onyx or vlz4 may sound ok but you would have to apply more gain than they are able to put out before the clipping starts to happen.. maybe?