Mackie 802 VLZ4 Reviews

Super flexible and small mixer

Super useful, good sounds, and an absurd amount of routing options. I like this for the stereo Alt 3+4 output, and for the high number of stereo ins for its size. If it had USB it would be perfect

4db channel imbalance on stereo inputs.

Stereo channels have a channel imbalance of 4db.

I just use the balance knob to level them out but 4 db is a lot.

Without that it would be my perfect mixer for the stuff i use it for.

A solid wee mixer

The only downside, I accept this without any regret, is the power supply is external: a box on the floor, and it makes a very quiet humming sound sometimes. But if it’s placed on a mat, or carpet, you cannot hear the hum at all.

It is VERY useful to have a few small mixers around. They can solve all sorts of technical problems.

Great mixer for the price!

The best mixer for small applications. Great sounding, easy to use and great metal finish. A big plus with this mixer is that it uses mackie's best preamps, the onyx preamps.

Can't recommend this enough!

Good price quality

Good mixer for the price.

Sound is decent, built like a tank!

Had it for a bit over two years and still does it's job.

One of the best sounding mixers

This mixer is my favourite so far. It has really really good sound and build quality, the knobs feels like they are made of one solid metal piece from the body of the mixer, and the rotating feel is very nice. I really appreciate the colours of the knob, they are only few different colours and they are subtle, as a result it does not look like a carnival or a toy like some other mixers.

The output options it has are amazing. The 12 LED level indicator is very nice and smoother than many others I bought in this price range.

One minor negative is the power supply and the top right corner of the unit near the mackie logo, they get very hot after a while of operation.

If you do not mind not having a USB dac input and sound effects I would totally recommend this mixer, I do not use any sound effects, and I have other dacs, so for me this mixer is, so far, my favourite in the 8 channels mixer range.

Great little mixer

This mixer is the best. Small size factor, with excellent quality build materials, and packing a ton of inputs/outputs and features. Also not expensive. Highly recommend guys.

Expand your musical playground

This is a low budget mixer that will surely improve your home studio. If you're looking for something to boost your sound quality and expand your musical playground (connect and record multiple devices, connect external fx, etc.) this will do IT.

The thing is sturdy and doesn't look and feel like a toy. I don't know of any downsides (yet). In the end, it's a mixer. The Mackie manual is written very well and helped me to decide which mixer to buy. If you're not sure that this is the unit you need, try reading the manual before actually buying it.

Versatile compact mixer

I was looking for a good quality mixer to connect various synths and grooveboxes to a hardware recorder and allow me to send signals to 3 different places - Hardware recorder, FX Loop or direct to the main output.

This is the smallest unit I could find that had 8 channels as well as alternate/cue out, FX loop and stereo return channel. The only other mixers that offer this are much bigger.

Sound quality is great, EQ is powerful and I have no need for cheezy built in FX. The flexible routing of signals makes this a real swiss army knife of audio.

Sometimes its a little confusing trying to get the FX loop and Alt send working together so you always hear FX when you want to, but thats just a setup and practice issue.

Of course there are a few small things that would be nice extras - level control for the Tape In/Out, stereo Aux send - but for the price and size, this is an amazing piece of gear.

Lots of featureas

I needed something to practice on, play with tracks also to act as a preamp for recording. I knew I needed a mixer of some sort but the reason I went for the Mackie 802 was the HI-Z switch and multitude of features.

I really did not want to mess around with a DI box, and good ones tend to be expensive so the Hi-Z switch is invaluable to me. EQ is pretty standard and usable.

It can be called a 2 bus mixer because the mute button sends the channel signal to a pair of separate outputs. This way you can output up to 4 mono tracks out of it.

The headphone amp is very powerful. I drive 250 ohm headphones and I keep the volume at 9:00 o'clock all the time. The power adapter cable is the longest I've ever seen. I like the LED meters on it, they could've put a short meter but they didn't, they put the 12 bar accurate ones.

The first unit that came had an issue, all the channels sounded slightly louder on the left side and I sent it back and got a replacement. The second unit is fine and going strong.

Mackie 802 won't let you down

Well designed and well built from good components. Works always as expected - and sometimes a little better. The 3 mic preamps sound warm and clean (tested mainly with guitar and voice).

Bonus: The routing of the muted channels to "Alt 3-4" output has really expanded the functionality of this mixer for me - sometimes in surprising ways.

Mackie 802 VLZ4

Fantastic bit of kit. It's more expensive than some of the competition, but the build & sound quality are better. Although I don't put any "critical" audio through my 802, I did some listening tests against other micro-mixers and this was by far the best; particularly when you start EQing. The I/O & routing is very flexible too.

If I were looking to fault it, I'd comment: There's no input trim on the stereo inputs, it uses an external power brick and you only get one mono aux (good news is it is switchable pre/post fader) - but what can you ask of a tiny 8ch mixer!?