This unit sounds great. There is a ton of headroom (no distortion) and plenty of gain on tap. I have synths that have lots of different levels and this can bring them all up to proper recording levels and then some.

Why doesn't everybody have an audio mixer like this and why isn't it more popular? I view it as my job to get everything down to a stereo signal before it hits a recording or mixing console. At times I have a mono drum machine, sequenced bass line, stereo pads, and lead with stereo delay all going at once. This helps me bring all of my signals together easily while sounding great. Most mixers in this price range pad the signal down to run it through their budget preamps and end up coloring your sound in a way that isn't great.

I'm really excited about the idea of hooking up another to create send/returns for my reverbs.

The bad thing is that the soldering work is awful. I bought two 4ms modules at the same time and they left gobs of flux all over the boards. The joints also tend to have too much solder. Beginners are taught better work than this. I'm also not a fan of the faceplates. They're just printed PCBs. I think that 4ms is going for modules that are as affordable as possible so I guess it's par for the course.

Regardless, it works and sounds even better than I expected, so I'm only dinging one star.

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I looked into finding a way to have a full featured mixer in the Eurorack space using only modules. There is nothing that does it all. If there was it would jump out and be the number one best seller. WMD builds an 8 stereo track module that they call a "Performance Mixer." It's got a lot of inputs and has two effect and return busses. It has the ability to bring the line level instruments and effects into it. It has one primary master mix out to the line level world for PA and amplifier use. It does not do sub mixing out.

But by using the 4ms Listen Four Quarters Eurorack Module and the 4ms Listen Four Eurorack Module chained together with their proprietary headers in the back of each module you can chain together many tracks with individual submixing out included. If you add an interface module like the 4ms Listen I/O Eurorack Module for each "4-cable" send-and-return loop then you can have unlimited effect and return channels. If 4ms would just build a stereo parametric EQ module then you could have a full featured live performance and recording deck right in your Eurorack space. And each user could select their own size and number of tracks. I have two Strymon AA.1 modules for the mixer I'm building now. I will be adding at least one 4ms Listen I/O Eurorack Module as I have need of several effect / return loops. I'm in search of a small HP parametric EQ to complete the big deck mixer.

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