Virtual Sound Check - Behringer X32

In this video, I use the Behringer X-USB card and Reaper to get 32 channels of audio to play back into the Behringer X32 for a Virtual Sound Check. I will often recommend recording mid-week rehearsals or events so that you have some audio from your space to practice mixing, or train volunteers and new staff.
Here is the USB cable I use: amzn.to/3AzOClB
Become a member and help support me and my channel: / drewbrashler
Watch the video on Multitrack Recording Setup if you missed it: • Multitrack Recording S...
Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:42 Initial Setup
01:36 Reaper Virtual Sound Check
01:57 Virtual Sound Check on Behringer X32
Find more articles and information at www.drewbrashler.com

[@NoTechHacker]

Virtual soundcheck is life changing. 🙂 One thing that confused me a bit at first was that the gain is saved separately for the record and play panels. If you're running a virtual sound check, make sure you don't adjust the input gain while in the "Play" panel, as it will not change the corresponding gain in the "Record" panel. You wouldn't want it to, but when I first got started with the X32 and mixing, it took me a little while to understand that. Eq, compression, fader level, etc., will all be maintained, but the gain needs to be kept at 0.0 on the Play panel if you want your mix to be accurately reflected when you switch back to the Record panel. I hope that makes sense, and thanks Drew for all your great tutorials!

[@donniestephenson8640]

My play back is extremely loud. Could that be what’s going on?

[@cheng1111]

@@donniestephenson8640 same, any one can advise on this?

[@sean_gruber]

@@donniestephenson8640 I've run into the same issue. Playback is extremely loud! I'm going to test out what the above comment is mentioning and see if the levels are back to normal after recording a session and playing it back virtually. I'll report back this week!

[@sean_gruber]

Okay, I think I finally figured it out. I had our worship leader play while I recorded him into Reaper, and then played it back as a virtual soundcheck. As I was recording him, I took note of the output level on the main left and right in the room. Note that I was adjusting his gain while recording until it consistently hit negative 18 dB. When I played the recording back, I adjusted the main output fader in Reaper further and further down until the output on the mains matched what the output was when he was playing live (not moving the main fader from where it was when he played live). I ended up having to drop that fader in Reaper from 0 to around -18, which means that Reaper was literally doubling the output, if that makes sense. Happy to try and explain this better if it doesn't! So, to get an accurate representation of what it sounds like in the house live when doing a virtual sound check for the whole band, I just have to drop the main output fader of Reaper down to -18. I've come across some other things that point to maybe this meaning that Reaper is sending out the audio as a stereo signal, but I'm not sure. Either way, I think this fixed it. 👍🏻

[@jonnthangarcia]

@@sean_gruber was your gains from both play and record matching? Or was your record set at 0?

[@original_pokey8896]

This was one of the top reasons why I wanted to go to a digital desk and it’s complete changed and improved the sound of our band. Being able to spend hours by myself with no pressure of time has made me a better sound dude. Using virtual sound check and your videos has helped me learn more in 5 months than I learnt in 10 years

[@waynebragg2099]

This video is awesome on virtual soundcheck for the future. we currently at the moment don't have a church band, but working towards that. Your other videos on Pastor sound check and overall voice sound check are on point. Continue adding helpful videos for those of us who are still exploring and learning our x32 console. God Bless!!!

[@memphismarkmusic56]

Fantastic Drew simple when you know how 🎶👍

[@nyochat12]

awesome, thanks a lot drew!!!

[@paulmorrey733]

Thanks Drew

[@malcolmdproducer]

HI Drew. Thank you for constantly keeping us up to date with sharpening our skills and talents. THis might be a little cheesy, but I would love to have some Church band multitracks from you which I can use to practice at home or with the mixer. So i can work on mixing better. And I guess I am speak for a lot of us who are following your content. Thanks & blessings

[@Salantsoundstudios]

Thanks drew! Love these vids. Can you make a video about using the x32 as a control surface for a DAW?

[@cmajor11th]

We keep a representative collection of multitrack recordings from previous gigs on an SD card in the X-LIVE card in the back of our X32 Rack. We play one or more of these recordings back as our virtual soundcheck... no separate PC or DAW needed. Such a fantastic capability for a small act with no dedicated FOH engineer! (Love your presentations Drew, they were a huge help in getting our X32 set up!)

[@BjorgenEatinger]

So are you saying then that I could bypass all of this recording stuff, the PC and the ProTools software, etc., and just load up a multi-track WAV file onto the SD card on the X-LIVE card (we have these in our consoles), and then just play back from the console itself? How is this done exactly?

[@cmajor11th]

@@BjorgenEatinger Yes.... just record a live performance direct to the SD card. You can start & stop recording from the X32 front panel (Setup > Card screens on the X32 Rack). Then just play back the recording, which also can be initiated from the same screens. There's some study and detail to getting it set up right the first time, but once done it's quite easy. Not only is it useful for a pre-show sound check, but you can also use it to experiment with any other kind of deep tweaks to your mix since it's really the multitrack raw performance input audio that's been captured; everything else downstream is 'real-time' and malleable during playback. Our duo plays to backing tracks with MIDI automation, so we've configured it to use MIDI to automatically start/end recording to the SD card for every song start/end. That way we leave every gig with a full set of multitrack recordings on the SD card. We occasionally pick a few to copy to the second SD card as reference for future virtual soundchecks. (If you have multi-track recordings made with some other system and tools (other than simply recorded with the X32), it is possible to convert it to the format that X32 understands, but IMO that's a more difficult and fiddly path.)

[@joshuamaddox4105]

@cmajor11th dude this needs more likes. I didn’t even know you could record back onto the card. Would it work with the stock x32 channel usb interface that comes pre-installed with the console?

[@cmajor11th]

@@joshuamaddox4105 You'll need to get an 'X-LIVE Expansion Card' (about $340 from Sweetwater) that plugs into the rear of the X32, replacing the USB Interface card that's there by default. This X-LIVE card includes two SD Card slots. The multitrack recordings are recorded to and played back from the SD Cards. I agree this is a killer feature... the multitrack recordings are the 'raw' audio capture as if your band is really playing live, so you can tweak pretty much every aspect of the X32 channel controls, mix, FX, etc. as if the band is exactly repeating the performance, no PC required.

[@joshuastromer9572]

I wish these were called “Hey There Reviews”. Haha. Thanks for your hard work man.

[@DrewBrashler]

Hah! Thanks man!

[@alexjonathan5398]

Hey Drew! Would be thrilled if you can share a link to that particular multi-track recording session!

[@kossiliassidji6602]

1- Have the Multi tracks file recorded in your computer 🖥 2- SETUP - CARD 32in/32out 3- ROUTINE Change the last case to play not record 4- Go to COMPUTER and play your recording from your DAW 5- Remember to reset from PLAY to RECORD

[@Neodime]

Hey Drew! Great videos! Can you do a video on the different usage of scenes and snippets! Thanks so much! Cheers!

[@francoprs]

Hi Drew, thank you for your in-depth videos on the X32 they are really great to learn from! Can you please make a video on how to do the same virtual soundcheck BUT incorporating external plugins from external applications, in particular for my interest the use of VST/VST3 plugins from inside Gig Performer 4. I am able to use them plugins in a live show but not through the normal Virtual soundcheck playback. So far I have not found any help on this subject and wondering if it's a limitation on the X32 Rack. Thanks in advance for your consideration.

[@MrRara93]

how do save your virtual soud check? do you save it on a scene? thanx for all of videos its really helpfull

[@HebraicandocomYohay]

Hello Drew, thank you! I followed all the settings you made, and I think I did everything right. I checked many times. What happens is that I can record, but can't hear from the mixer. I can hear from the computer what I recorded, but in the mixer I don't get any signal.

[@tracycanoy]

Hey Drew, Just purchased your X32 Channel and Preset Bundle. We mainly run Vocals and Acoustic Guitar on Sundays. Question: What 4 Effect presets should I load in from your presets to send my Vocals and Acoustic Guitar to? Also can you tell me which effect to send vocals to and which effect to send guitar to?

[@gpcr01bb84]

Hi Drew, thank you so much for your video. This is so useful as is your entire channel. I have one question: How would you set up the routing on the X32R as well as on your Daw (I used Studio 1) to be able to send back tracks from the daw into the X32R and at the same time play along with my instruments and record what I'm playing in my Daw ? This would be really useful for us when we compose our own songs. Thanks a lot. Brice

[@adbeaver1]

Hey Drew! Could you please do a virtual sound check video for the wing? I almost have it working right but for some reason a few channels aren’t recording. I’d love to see a video on that!

[@jonahbarasinopre]

Hi Drew, could you please also do how to set up virtual soundcheck on the X32 using Studio One DAW? This would be much appreciated. Thanks

[@randomschittz9461]

Can you please make a video showing how to get some tracks coming back to the board from the DAW while recording into the DAW at the same time?

[@takaliuang]

I also use Reaper, really help 😅

[@MasterWhisperer]

Is there any way you can use 1 mic from the X32 @ FOH to check the sound levels on all of the other mics when doing your sound check to get proper gain levels. I've seen it done on an analog unit but would love to be able to do my sound check from FOH instead of getting someone to go to each individual mic and talk into it.

[@Gaasserocker]

Hi Drew, thanks a lot for all these videos! Learnt a lot yet!🙏🏻 X32 with reaper following your instructions. Got a problem with my first recording: I cannot pan any of my channels to left or right in my mix while playing back on the X32…. Could you help me? Thanks a lot, cheers from Luxembourg, Fränk

[@memphismarkmusic56]

Wondering Drew is it possible to re record like say the vocals on your virtual sound check while having the rest of the tracks playback allowing the vocalist to hear the recorded band through the PA via the X32. Could you do a video on that please? Thanks so much 🙏

[@jordanhenshaw]

Just record the main mix through the recorder and play it back on an input.

[@jeffpyzocha5474]

Drew, Now, this is the same idea behind using the x32 as an interface for recording right? Also, are you going out of the Main LR or the Monitor LR? and what would be best for recording? And also for playback and doing my mixing within my DAW (cakewalk BTW) with effects, eq etc as I know the processing on the x32 does not transfer over to cakewalk, and so when I am mixing on cakewalk, I want to hear those results and not on the x32? Thanks!!!

[@mosesmowph1329]

Hello Sir Drew I'm from Cebu Philippines. I watched your vidoes and it is very informative to me. I just wanted to ask one question Sir Drew when it comes to two consoles like FOH console & LIVE stream console my question is it is possible to mix LIVE stream console without affecting the FOH console?

[@edward5525]

Hey 👋 Drew my question is let say the piano player and bass don’t show up for the service, How to use the virtual sound , voices live but instruments in virtual

[@richmondappiagyei1866]

Please Drashler, can i play my music from my tablet or iphone wireless through the console and let it output to the main speakers?

[@Gershy13]

Is there a way to have a shortcut to switch record and play? On the assign buttons or something.

[@stasta74]

How do you send click track to your musicians when you are in input mode. I mean, if you want to record in your DAW but you want to send the click track in their headphones. How do you setup? Thanks. P.s. great videos.

[@IMakeBeats]

Quick question 🙋🏽‍♂️, will the effects and EQ be recorded to the SD card or thumb drive when recording? For me this will be very important because im completely standalone and will not be using a DAW at all! Looking 👀 forward to hearing back from you. I really want all my effects and EQ to be recorded.

[@Bk26342]

Hey Drew, am I able to play reaper recordings through the x32 edit MacBook app?

[@christopherheadcase6886]

This may be a noob question. But in the event a band sends you tracks to set a virtual sound check. Do you just need to make sure those signals leaving reaper are around -18 db to allow you to set the gain on the x32 at -18?

[@soulshine9666]

For Virtual Sound Check practise purposes I would love to have a multi-track recording like the one you're using. Can I download somewhere...? Tnx!

[@7thundersbiblestudies210]

Hi, Drew...our church has been having sound issues in house and live feed. And i know its not gear, ive been rocking since the 80s, but on analog mix gear. I'm not an engineer, im a guitar guy. The space we play in is an odd shape, so im thinking that the pa speakers woukd be best used by being up high and angled downward. The livestream is out an output, but not the one thats built for it. Eq and effects are easy enough to handle, but id like to have some sort of plan to go from point A to point B in order to fully fix our sound and properly use the x32 to its best potential for what we have going. Help?

[@krzysztofgadkowski3502]

Hello, I really appreciate your videos and professional tutorials. I just faced the following issue. X32 Compact, standard USB card. Setup REAPER correctly. As X32 Compact has only 16 MIC preamps, I connected line inputs to all the Aux1, Aux2, Aux3, Aux4, Aux5, Aux6. Routing is as follows: INPUT RECORD: Local 1-8, Local 9-16, User In 17-24, Local 25-32, Aux Ins INPUT PLAY: Card 1-8, Card 8-16, Card 17-24, Card 25-32, Aux Ins CARD: Local 1-8, Local 9-16, User In 17-24, User Out 1-8 User In 17-24: Aux1/2/3/4/5/6 (used) + In23/24 (not used) User Out 1-8: Out1, Out2, Out3, Out5, Out11, Out12, Out7, Out8 (want to record busses and main mix) Channels settings: In 17,18,19,20,21,22: SOURCE set to: Aux 1,2,3,4,5,6 Problem: recording using REAPER looks good, while playback from REAPER does not play back into channels 17-22. Based on above routing table, I was expected to sent channel from card 17 into User In 17 which is Aux1, but there is no sound. Are there Aux inputs excluded somehow from receiving signals from USB Card? Other channels are playback successfully, i.e. local channel 16. I would be grateful for an answer and advice.

[@krzysztofgadkowski3502]

OK, I just found the root cause and solution ;-) To hear the recorded 17-24 tracks from REAPER, you need to switch channels' 17-24 source to Card17-24. It looks like when you switch the INPUT routing from RECORD to PLAY, all the channels are gettng source=CardXX, except the channels which had assigned source=AuxX (i.e. channels 17-24). Looks like a bug, which could be fixed by Behringer?

[@raphaeltschapek7720]

Is there a way to use multitrack playback simultaneously with Waves superrack performers?

[@sb-vy8cw]

Is there anyway of sending your final mix into a computer to record it. As if your were mixing a studio session on the desk instead of a daw.

[@asrafasari8710]

Hai. Thanks for helpfull video. I want to ask, why my mixing was ok, but if i record and playback for virtual sound check, the volume was changed? prease help me. Thankyou

[@Backtoflying]

1:13 you won’t see the play record button unless you have firmware later than 4.0 make sure you follow the instructions to back up your scene settings before you update the firmware!

[@chrisdoratproductions8680]

what type or how powerfull does the laptop need to be, and are you recording to the local hard drive and how big does it need to be?

[@bdunn3696]

Drew... I am attempting to set up Studio One 6 with the X32 for sound check. As far as I can tell, I have everything set up as you have illustrated, however when playing back I am not receiving audio back thru the board. (I am seeing meters in Studio One so I know I have captured the recording) I am using a newer MacBook Pro M1 machine. Am I missing a setting on the MacBook ?

[@sj0024]

How can I record instruments going into the aux channels and play back?

[@williamlivingston175]

Can I fix clipping channels in the virtual sound check?

[@jeffjackson6984]

This video has been so helpful. I was able to record on reaper with no problems. Unfortunately for some reason when we play it back through the soundboard we only get static and it doesn't show anything on the board to indicate that anything is playing. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[@kevinmerino7432]

Make sure your card outputs are set correctly. This happened to me as well and I took a look at my card outputs and they weren’t set correctly but once I fixed them everything was good to go

[@timomeschkat5694]

Hey, I used Multitrack Recording an want to do a virtual Soundcheck. I used all the setzings you show in youre Video and when i play the Recording in the DAW, i only get a stereo signal on chanel 1 and 2 from my whole Recording. Do you have any idear how i can fix it? Thanks.

[@AudioEmpire1]

sir x32 to smart v8 routing explain

[@Senzenfrenz]

Hey Drew, you're really great in explaining how this works. I have one question: In the other video where you set up the console to do multi-track-recording, the 6th knob is set to record and it shows the inputs routing set to local 1-8, 9-16 etc. as preconfigured in the x32. Now in this here video as I can see f.ex. at 3:44, the 6th knob also is configured to record (you are showing that you won't accidently leave it configured to play for your live mix) but as you do so, the input routing now shows user in 1-8, 9-16 and so on. What does that mean and why is it set to user in there? (because that's actually the only thing I would not logically understand from that two videos, I thought it has to be local inputs as in the other video because you're doing just the same). Thanks in advance for your response, God bless you

[@Timmyyycx]

Don't know if you already got your answer but if you didnt -> User In is just a different setting for HIS own, customized setting (e.x. mixed Local and AES50A). Do as he says in previous vid, which is set YOUR settings inside Card tab, as you have in the Input tab. Hope it helped

[@tedstorto-jc9eq]

Hey Drew I been watching you for long- I use x32 for sound- I have been use x-live to record bands and has all way done ok- record and play- last week I wanted to play back a session and an error comes up- I can’t play anything - took card in and out - nothing- inserted in my Mac mini and all files are there and downloadable-??? Do you know what has happen Thanks

[@theuneditedhuman7515]

What a legend this guy is!! Give him a star on Hollywood BLVD 😂

[@ilovegsus]

Hi Drew, thank you for doing these videos...really helped me a lot with improving our sound at church! I have this problem though, when I playback recordings from Reaper it is much louder than the actual live performance...how do I set it so that live and the soundcheck match level wise? Thanks in advance!

[@seandgruber]

I’ve had the same issue I’ve been trying to figure out for a long time now. Any updated insights? Thanks!

[@ilovegsus]

@@seandgruber i figured it out…when in playback mode on the console, set the trim on all channels to -6db. Also just set all your tracks in reaper to zero db before recording. The trim basically just lowers the input gain from thr daw. You can also just not touch the console and just adjust the tracks to -6db in reaper, but that is kinda messy and bigger chances of unintentional fader changes

[@gpcr01bb84]

@@ilovegsus Hi there, thanks for the info on this. How did you determine that you needed to decrease the trim to -6db ? I use Studio One.

[@ilovegsus]

@@gpcr01bb84 i saw it from some forum a while back, so what i did to test was i recorded a guitar loop on my helix and played it back (di'd to the mixer). As the loop is playing, i recorded that onto reaper. then from reaper i played it back via virtual soundcheck. so i just A/B'd between the virtual soundcheck and my guitar loop from the helix and they sound the same level-wise. Also, if you don't want to change the trim level on the console, you can just set all the faders from your daw playback to -6db instead (it should work the same way)

[@kevinmerino7432]

I also found that as default reaper puts the output as stereo on channel 1 as well so you have to disable that and that will also fix the problem of it being too loud

[@enochbenoit3111]

Hey Drew or anyone else, when I try this, it only comes out of line 1 and 2? Any ideas on how to fix???

[@shary6637]

Hi there👋, can i record multitrack in FL Studio? Pls help me

[@marian9445]

GarageBand records multitrack, but when playing back on x32 it’s only stereo (ch 1 & 2). Any ideas?

[@robertlyle3806]

I'm using Ableton Live 10 / Win10 / X32 Producer. I've recorded and played back 13 channels of audio BUT when I do play back ... all 13 channels play back through channels 1 and 2 but not into the other 11 channels. What do I need to do to get channel 1 to play back only through channel 1, 2 only to 2, 3 only to 3, etc. I can't effectively do virtual sound check unless I can control play back volume for each channel. Thanks!

[@robertlyle3806]

I figured it out ... master output table needs to be set to stereo. Each individual channel needs to be set "Ext out" and then mapped to 1/2 or 3/5 or 5/6 or 7/8, etc.

[@LaT1NaS0]

Apologies if this question has already been asked, but would you recomend making eq adjustments for each channel while listening with in-ears or purely through FOH? Or potentially initially with in-ears then see what the overall sound is like via FOH?

[@almanzarentertainment9489]

Virtual is definitely a game changer but I’m having a slight issue. Some of my mic lines are not recording what can be the issue ? everything is plugged in and the mic lines are coming out the monitors but just not the recording

[@jayceecarlos]

Is there a way to have the recorded multitrack from reaper, playback to x32 edit without having the console connected to the computer?

[@DrewBrashler]

No, sadly this is not possible. X32-Edit is only an offline editor or a remote control to a sync'ed and connected console. Hope this helps!

[@nanigideon9465]

Please can I get the link to the previous video?

[@DrewBrashler]

Sure thing! kzbin.info/www/bejne/f4G0lnaPmbFshtU

[@QB247]

Drew, I had a 32-channel multi-track recording on my Mac in Logic Pro. When I connected my Mac to a Behringer x32 (full) for a virtual sound check and tried to map a channel to any mono output other than output 1 or output 2, I would not get any sound on the x32. When I map the channel\track to mono output 1, I would get sound on the x32 on both 1 & 2. 1 & 2 are not linked on the x32. The card was set to 32x32, and I had to switch from record to play; what went wrong? Can anyone help? FYI, the recording was from an SQ-7, but that shouldn't matter; I only have to change the output when I connect to the x32? I could not figure out why I could not map my 32-channel recording to any channels other than 1 & 2. At the end of that night, after a lot of frustrations, a dialogue box popped up saying something to the effect that daws inputs 1 & 2 and outputs 1 & 2 or something to that effect. I was tired and frustrated, so I didn't quite capture it. Drew, by the way, your videos are awesome! Thank you

[@tacan19A]

Do you know if there is a way to use my Reaper file to run a virtual sound check in X32 Edit program on my PC so that I can save my settings as a scene and load it to the console later?

[@DrewBrashler]

Unfortunately no, X32 Edit is not set up to do this. That would be sweet though!

[@tacan19A]

@@DrewBrashler Yes, it would be sweet. Maybe it's something they will make available in the future. Thanks anyway!

[@KenDeavers]

But how to do it with Supperrack Performer?

[@RealAlphaDrum]

You really need to mention the gain knob for virtual sound check as it does not adjust live gain, but simply adjusts a digital gain playback, and does not match nor carry over back to the live gain level.

[@mr_mc_the_first6579]

So, with this 32 in/out my aux in/out are useless 😒 my playback for singers comes in on an aux, that will be lost on a multitrack recording and virtual soundcheck is not helpful in those cases.

[@EddieRdz0590]

You need to configure the routing section in order to record the aux inputs as well. Look at this kzbin.info/www/bejne/rZmcd4Ggjteaj8k

[@mr_mc_the_first6579]

@@EddieRdz0590 but 32 XLR + 6 Aux = more than 32 In on the card. That was my original argument

[@kevinmerino7432]

@@mr_mc_the_first6579 yeah if you want your 6 aux ins to record you would have to sacrifice 6 xlr inputs

[@andreas-wismann]

Bammm - Earblasting noise at 02:25 - better turn your headphones down!!!!!!!!!!!