High School: Qu vs iLive

[MacMusicGuyParticipant]

I work at a grades 6-12 school [US] which is trying to replace an ageing Mackie board. The performing space is VERY active, with everything from school meetings to full-on musical productions as well as many outside groups coming in.

I have some experience with an iLive board from about 3 years ago, and really liked the board once we got everything setup. However, the QU series looks INTERESTING. Sadly, there’s no way to get my hands on one to check it out directly.

I’m thinking that the Qu series, compared to iLive:
• loses the ability to reconfigure the board based on the login
• is less flexible in terms of system setup [i.e. the basic architecture is more fixed]
• has fewer effects
• and costs quite a few pennies less

Besides the obvious differences in the physical outputs/inputs, is that a decent summary? I’m assuming sound quality is similar, given it’s A&H and these are digital.

Opinions on what path to take? I’m currently thinking the Qu-32 plus the AR2412 audio rack, to be placed onstage.

Let the opinions fly!

[GCumbeeParticipant]

You can’t go wrong either way. I just recently did a similar install at a large church multi-purpose room. QU-32/AR2412. They love it. With several operators it works well for them. This was right when 32 was coming out. We had to wait awhile. I loaned them my GLD-80 to get going. They feel the 32 is easier for them. Configurations are not a problem.

I have an install coming up soon in a youth auditorium in a new wing being built at a local church. I am using QU24/AR2412 for that. Most of my projects just don’t have larger budgets.

You’ll find that QU will do pretty much everything you want. If you do think you might need more inputs or want more console flexibility like iLive then consider GLD 80 or 112 with just about all features of iLive and maybe a few more. With the new reduced pricing they are a great value.

I love them. I think you would too.

[tylermartin86Participant]

I am someone who uses a GLD quite often and I highly recommend looking at the GLD series. Personally I prefer the GLD screen/menu setup to the iLive. The GLD is a scalable system so if you currently only need 32 inputs then find later that you need an extra 8, you can easily do that. The GLD is also newer and is updated a bit more than the iLive series. The Qu is not a bad console at all, but the GLD gives you much more flexibility and features than the Qu series. The only reason I see going to the iLive series is if you absolutely need 48+ channels.

[dpdanParticipant]

another A+ for the QU and GLD mixers… WONDEFUL!

[robbocurryParticipant]

“loses the ability to reconfigure the board based on the login”

You can set user access levels on the QU series.

QU series have four onboard FX units, how many do you need!?

[GusParticipant]

MacMusicGuy,

I’m in a high school setting also.

Last fall we purchased 2 Qu-32 and a Qu-16. 32 at each high school auditorium and the 16 in our portable rig.

My crew and I had looked at all of the less expensive digitals over the past year and landed on the Qu series. We are working to train more students on audio and lighting so I wanted consistency between auditoriums and something that students could get skills on in a short time. Decided on the Qu because:

32 channels and 32 faders… they don’t have to work in layers to do the basic work
Only 3 layers… channel, output and custom. Custom fader lets my adult engineers create a really friendly layer.
Touch screen and display that helps students operate and visualize EQ, Dynamics, etc.
18 channel recording to a USB drive and 32 channel in to a laptop right out of the box ! No additional cards to buy.
Plug and play digital snake and personal monitors.

We have large stage productions as well. If they need more than 32 channels we side car the Qu-16 and combine the necessary outputs. No, not Y cables !

We love the consoles. The only thing that I hope they fix is the inability to move or insert scenes. It is easy to select and re-call scenes with the soft keys. But, the inability to add/delete/arrange scene order is really a compromise for a show.

Gus

[[XAP]BobParticipant]

Query – can you not rename them when exported?

I know it’s a pain, but they are just numbered dat files…

[GusParticipant]

I have tried to open the scene library from the USB drive and while I can look at them on my PC I can’t move them or rename them.

Any ideas? That would be useful.

Gus

[MacMusicGuyParticipant]

4 is probably enough – I’m primarily trying to get a feel for the differences between the lines [especially the QLD vs Qu, now that I’m looking further into it.]

There ARE varying user access levels on the Qu? I’ve been looking for that particular nugget of info, and haven’t run across it yet. Thanks!

[Dick ReesParticipant]

There ARE varying user access levels on the Qu? I’ve been looking for that particular nugget of info, and haven’t run across it yet. Thanks!

Home screen > User

P. 39 in the User Guide

[GusParticipant]

Here’s what I’ve learned so far…I think.

Scenes are created/named at the console.

You can save them to a USB drive. If you look at the USB file on a computer you cannot re-order them. You can rename them but the names will not transfer back to the Qu intact. They hold on to their scene number.

But, if you create on the console and save them to a drive you can put them back to the console scene list in any order you like but you can’t insert them. They overwrite whatever was in the scene number/field before. You can create new scenes at the end of the console list and save them to the drive to then put them where you want them. Yes…in this process you have to reload the scene list or part of it every time you want to reorder your show.

Haven’t tried this yet… but I noticed that when you are recalling scenes in order, the “next” “previous” function skips over any scene number/field that is empty. Might be a good strategy to leave some blanks between scenes when you first setup your show scenes so you could “insert” them to an empty space.

Still, this process is tedious at best and a ridiculous way to try to manage 100 scenes.

Move & Insert Please !

Gus

[mervakaParticipant]

You can move scenes using copy and paste.

[[XAP]BobParticipant]

Presumably only one at a time…

The concept of BaSIC line numbering to allow for later inserts is outdated at best. If we had an unlimited number of scenes then maybe, but we don’t…

[Author]

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