Our aim was to produce a simple but very high quality unit, with an affordable price tag. It seemed to us that most DAWs these days had plenty of internal controls, and there was little point in duplicating these. We wanted to focus on the requirements outside the box for real systems of speakers. The unit provides 8 inputs and 8 outputs on TRS jacks, 8 trimmers (+/-6dB) and 1 volume knob.

DACS Eightch 8-Channel Volume Controller Specifications
Each VCA is trimmed to achieve the best possible performance. This is done when the unit has been switched on long enough to achieve thermal stability, usually about ten minutes. This means that the factory set performance will not be achieved until the unit has been on for around ten minutes. In addition it should not be placed immediately above or below very hot running equipment, and should be positioned where a reasonably consistent temperature will be maintained.

The Eightch is factory set to provide unity gain through all channels when the volume is at maximum. On many consoles, you would probably expect the monitor volume control to be around 12 o'clock for fairly high level monitoring. With the Eightch, best performance is achieved by setting your speaker/amplifier to provide the maximum likely output level when the Eightch volume control is at maximum. The trimmers are included to allow you to adjust for different front and rear speakers, or for setting up surround mixes where the rear level is lower than the front.

The Ingenius input ICs perform extremely well in terms of hum rejection and stability, and performance is not effected by the use of an unbalanced source. The same is true of the outputs. In addition, the signal level for unbalanced outputs is the same as for balanced outputs (some balanced equipment, if connected to an unbalanced destination, suffers a 6dB reduction in level).

Click here to view all DACS products