I'm noticing more and more that boards I see in clubs do not have direct outputs too often. I know that you can trick an insert to send a direct feed but this is not always possable.

I don't do live sound but I know a little about it. Inserts would be used to go to a compressor or other dymanic processors right?

Maybe I'm not right... If a board has auxes and inserts what is used for what? I assume auxes are used for delays and reverbs... Even to do monitors in small clubs.

Why I'm posting is that my 16 track rig is getting finalized and I have had opertunities to record some great bands multitrack. I am peicing this together myself with low budget. Essentially I have 2 MOTU 896's and a G4 laptop with fast external hard drive.
I have 2 eight channels HOSA 1/4" mono snakes and a bunch or XLR's I made. I have mics and stuff too but cna't expect to double mic the entire stage (PA and to tape). I was under the impression that more consoles had direct outputs.

Friday, the soundguy told me there wasn't any but I think he was a tool that didn't know the house board well (small club in Albany) It was cramped in the input section and I didn't see direct outs but I think it might have been an Allen and Heath (I know I know, but I didn't take a good look, I trusted the house guy) that might have had direct outs under the XLR inputs (hard to see from above).

Tuesday I can record a great national act in a club in Boston that has an Allen and Heath GL3 (16 channel I think) which I believe has no direct outputs (please correct me if I'm wrong). It has inserts and I can likely do the 1/2 in trick to get a feed. BUT will the soundguy (who I can't get to answer his cell) be using the inserts for effects at all? I obviously couldn't ask him not to. Mind you this is pro-bono and I'm not on a budget. There doing me a favor letting me do this and I'm not getting paid squat. I want to test the setup and it would be sweet to have a multitrack of this band that I like to mix for fun!!!

Anyway, WTF can I do? What do you guys do? Should I build or buy a splitter box? Not for Tuesday but for the future? Is this very common for the club scene? I want my direct outputs damn it!!

I can't think of anything I can do without dropping some major loot, can you?

So whats the scoop on this out there?

The cheapest solution I could think of would be to build some "Y" and possibly "N" cables to act as splitters and get ( rent, lease, buy, borrow) a console or some preamps to get the signals to line level ( think Allen and Heath Mox Wizard, small Mackie, whatever ) to go into the Motu boxes. Steve Remote had a nifty drawing of a Y and a N cable on here a while back , could you re-post it Steve? You may also want to build some XLR jumpers that lift the audio ground so that you can isolate your computer from the main PA.

Your best bet is to build (or buy) a nice little 16 channel mic splitter. Make sure you use good transformers like Jensen and such. I have a great lead on them. If you're interested send me an email or PM. thumbsup

It's the only real way to do it. Why be stuck with the quality of the mic pres you got on a cheap FOH console? Furthermore, some consoles set the direct outs post EQ. You may not want that EQ setting, especialy if the FOH engineer is EQing for the room and not for the track. stike

A nice 3 way splitter is forever. Female XLR inputs wired directly to Male XLR outputs and the primary side of the transformers. Then the two output windings can go to two sets of Male XLR outputs. If you want to get real, add individual ground lifts for the transformer side outputs and everything will be everything!

Here's a thread about splitters you maybe interested in checking out...

Why do you want to go split that perfectly good mic anyway?