SSL Big SiX

It was my first serious mixer out of upper price range. And this expirience was really disappointing. I expected to enjoy high quality of SSL products but got an unit with terrible tickling noise problem. As I found on various forums I am not alone and may users around the world had the same trouble. But the most disappointing part of this experience is communication with SSL support as they response very slowly and you can wait for response for a week or more.

So please be aware of this common problem and ask for testing before buying if it is possible.

Nevertheless, the features of this mixing console are awesome and versatile it contains almost all you may want to have and beyond in you home project studio. 16 channel including 4 superanalogue channels with eq and compressor. I guess sound of this mixer is pretty good too if my unit was not faulty. If SSl had proper quality control during production of this product this mixer was the best value you can have for its price.

After having the big six for 6 months channel 16 output into the daw has died so I cant bus-sum through it which defeats the purpose. I had a noise problem that made some of my recordings unusable and contacted SSL they sent me a retrofit i choose not to install it and since the other issues and sent it back to Thomann because this unit is broken. Disappointed with SSL support only offering a discount on plugins that are worse than their black Friday sales. I still believe the SSL big six sounds great and has tremendous functionality so if the problems are fixed on a new unit I'm happy, but still concerned.

I've had the BiG SiX for just over a month now and there's a lot to love. I think the SSL BiG SiX introduced tremendous value into my studio for the cost, allowing it to become the central hub.

I watched a lot of reviews before choosing to get this unit most of the complaints mentioned by reviewers weren't a factor to me in use. In general, it offers me more than I need, but as always could benefit from a few other features found on more typical audio interfaces. (midi, Adat, Second thunderbolt to connect up to two units or some way to expand the unit with other SSL ecosystem products.

Starting with the mic pres, the headroom of the preamps is great they're so clean and sound amazing i noticed an instant difference compared to my old audio interface. The EQs are musical and more versatile than they are limited. The 4 compressors on channels 1-4 are useful sometimes people use compression for the color from the transformers and pushing the saturation and harmonics of a signal but SSL are known for their clean punchy sound, I have Neve preamps and more colorful bus compressors and plenty of plugins that sound great for that stuff. I find the sound of the SSL compliments and tightens up a mix, gluing everything together and having a modern sound. The G comp on the SSL B6 is great as well I know people say that it has fewer features so it's not as good but for a bus compressor I never found I needed crazy high ratios to achieve an effect id rather have that in the box so I can bypass or go back than print that in a hybrid workflow. It has the same G Comp circuit topology and sounds better than some of my other outboard compressors.

Since I'm using mac I made an aggregate device with another audio interface to expand my studio's I/O

Using this as the hub allowed me to get rid of a lot of connections on my patch bay since you just hit a button and go from USB into the SSL six from my daw instead of a traditional audio interface where you would route that into a patch bay

After recording a track I compared the stems printed out through protools using an SSL g bus comp plugin on the master bus, and then bus summing through the SSL B6 using the G series comp (not engaging the EQ or channel comps) I asked people if they could hear the difference, I immediately noticed more stereo width/detail and the higher headroom allows you to push it a bit more while still sounding good. The last annoying thing about the SSL B6 is that the monitor outputs are 15/16 since it's in a mixer format and that's at the end of the I/O so you have to route your daw and change settings to recognize that. Usually, an audio interface always has 1/2 as main outputs but once you set up your audio midi setup on mac it works and you don't have to change anything. I was worried that the conversion quality wouldn't be as good as say a UA apollo but it sounds great to me, better than what I had before.

The value you get is amazing, the SSL 6 channel strip is updated compared to the 6ix and 500 series ones currently available (better comp and EQ). To buy 4 SSL 500 series six channels, LMC Compressor a G series bus comp, 8 channels of D/I line preamps, and a 500 series chassis with USB or adat to house it all would cost 6937€ It would be more flexible obviously but that puts in perspective the value I think the big six offers.

Pros:
Great mic preamps with headroom
Useful compressors and eq's
powerful headphone preamps
Well Implemented USB connectivity/ Routing
Flexible Routing
Excellent mix bus summer
Powerful line inputs

Cons:
Mic channel inserts (send return) are after the preamp gain.
no ADAT
Limited to 12 channel recording/summing
Routing of the Talkback mic could be better for more practical use of the LMC(Listen Mic Compressor)
2 monitor outputs

Though I did lust for this mixer when it first came out, I never thought I would actually buy one. It seemed a bit extravagant. The original MSRP was way over my budget. Then I saw the Thomann price. Still way over my budget but significantly lower than anywhere else. “F… it!” Sold my old audio interface and mixer along with a few other dusty items and pulled the trigger. Very glad I did. This has become the centerpiece in my studio. So much practical functionality and excellent sound quality. It’s really convenient having a main hub I can run everything through. I think SSL found a nice balance of size and function. Not too big, not too small. Lastly, it’s just beautiful to look at… and to occasionally pet, if you’re into that sort of thing. Overall, very pleased with the Big Six. I will love her forever… or at least until the Bigger Six with the motorized faders and $6K price tag is released. I should mention that I did have to pay a fee to clear customs and it did take some time to arrive, but I definitely saved a lot of $$$ compared to other retailers.