Zoom LiveTrak L-8

Great for quick and efficient Field Recs & Demos

as stated above, works well! However I have yet to test in PA setup as to its gigability, studio worthy though? not in my opinion.

Perfect for home studio

Bought this to use as a mixer for or family band with 2 guitars, mic and e-drums. We’ve been able to record our rehearsals and practice along with the recording. The build quality is perfect and interface is very intuitive and super easy to use. The only thing I’m missing is Bluetooth to play with a backing track from an iPhone but I can record it via cable and then play from the recorder which is even better.

It's a nice mixer but I don't really like the fact that you can only use effect at a time. I would've liked to use both delay and reeverb on my chanels. The multi track recording works great!

Excellent tool for in-ear solutions

I got this as an all-in-one in-ear solution for my band. We are a 4-piece and can run 4 sets of headphones, each with their own mix. It has built-in headphone amps with 4 outs, so I didn't have to worry about building a rack. (yes, we are using long cables instead of wireless, please cashapp us some money)

There are LEDs next to the volume sliders, which show you where your volume was last set on — so when another musician moves the sliders to get the volume right for his mix, you can go back and adjust your mix without an issue.

You can save your mixes to 4 different Scene presets, so you can always save your mix and go back to it if you mess something up.

Also, built-in reverb, so the sound in our ears isn't "dry". The EQ helps shave off any guitar high frequencies that may be too harsh in the earphones.

I wish the EQ was also customizable per headphone out. As it is, each mix can have various volumes and various FX return applied to them, but the EQs of the channels are a global setting, which is a bit of an issue when we are using different models of earphones.

This is marketed as a tool for podcasts and I can absolutely see it working this way. The microSD card slot is awesome for recording our practices, too! Plenty of in and out options, controls feel fluid and responsive, it was a great buy.

Fantastic

Very flexible and a lot of fun. Mostly use it connected via USB to my DAW on my computer, to record vocals, electric guitar and acoustic instruments. Have also used for live performance.

It is fine as a mixer, but unusable as a class compliant audio interface!

I've bought this mixer to route my external synths into the Maschine+ which is running in standalone mode.

According to the specifications, my decision was a no brainer.

- Possibility to operate with batteries for better portability

- 96kHz audio processing + audio effects

- class compliant audio interface mode

- recording feature with overdub!

More I used the mixer more I got disappointed.

Here's what I've find good, bad and terrible about this mixer.

Good:

Sound and build quality.

It works as a class compliant audio interface (Maschine+ recognizes it) (if you are interested in this please read the terrible part!)

More than enough monitoring outs.

Bad:

In 96kHz, you can only use the unit as a mixer (Recording in 96kHz might work too but I don't need it)

All rest of the functionality like ABC Mixes, effects and Audio Interface mode only work in 41kHz mode.

I've used the unit with Eneloop Ni-Mh batteries, it doesn't run for a long time, maybe 1 hour?

Alkaline surely lasts longer but who doesn't get bad conscience replacing alkaline batteries every 2 hours?

Overall handling of the device feels retro (but in a bad way). Some of the options like putting the unit into audio interface mode are not saved, so you have to put the unit into that mode every time you power it up.

Input channels 7 and 8 are shared with output 1/2 and 3/4 correspondingly, when used in audio interface mode. So you can not hear the output from the host, when you are recording from those channels.

Recording with overdub is definitely is not the overdub you know from DAWs, so don't expect it to work like a guitar looper.

Terrible:

Here comes the most annoying thing about this mixer (if you want to use it as a class compliant audio interface).

You can use the unit as a class compliant audio interface ONLY IF you power the unit with batteries!!!

As the unit wants you to unplug the usb cable befor switching into the class compliant mode.

Such a terrible design!

Multifunction tool - does many things quite well

I needed a mixer for small streaming/video gigs, including outdoor events with no AC power, plus a backup for my main PA mixer and a replacement for my Zoom L6 for small recording tasks.

It does everything I want but not as well as using more expensive specialist tools. Probably the best thing is the battery power, so it's very quick and easy to get out and set up at home or take to an outdoor event (I have some battery powered PA speakers). As a multitrack recorder it's pretty good and a very useful balance of functionality and portability, it's very compact for an 8-channel mixer. I've added an ART dual pre to make it a true 8 input microphone mixer.

But I would always use my Soundcraft ui24 digital mixer in preference if circumstances allow. The L-8 lacks any parametric EQ or compression, and no EQ on the outputs, the hybrid digital/analog controls are fiddly and require concentration, so it's not intuitive.

So not perfect but a wide range of useful functions, especially if you have good quality inputs that don't need much treatment

Unit is disffunctional

Unit did work properly. there is no support number or email to contact for help.

Usb disconnect constantly

As a device it works well if you're not using it as USB audio interface. Tried changing USB ports and cable but it was disconnecting from time to time so I had to restart vMix and stop external video outputs (big venue screen) and streams to make it work again. After a few failures switched back to cheaper Beringer interface, that was stable. I've read about the same issue from others.

Lovely modern mixer/audio card

Very good mixer, flexible, low noise, and usable as an USB audio card, where all the channels can be seen individually. Very practical for gigging with friends, and recording everyone individually, or just the master outputs.

Also works pretty well with Jamulus, to participate to online jam sessions, alone or with friends connected to the mixer. I expect it to work equally well with other similar softwares.

I am very satisfied by it, the L-8 has become an invaluable companion of my home music setup. Better than this would be only if it fully supported 96kHz in USB mode.