Cooper 106+1

[Michael P Clark]

I have sent a couple emails to Cooper with no responses, so I am asking here, since a lot of you have this mixer or similar. I am about to get a great deal on a Cooper 106+1, and am interested in expanding it. I can add an Aux module, or an additional channel to the current chassis. Is it possible to have a 106+1 expanded(chassis expansion, of course) to a 108+1, and add an Aux module? And does anyone know what that might cost? I understand that the best place to get that info is with Cooper, but I am not getting any call backs. So hopefully someone here has tried this or did this with theirs.

Thanks

Mike

[Guest afewmoreyears]

Andy does things his own way......  Give him another call or two....  you'll get him......    once you do, he is a very nice guy and will answer your questions.....  Sometimes it takes a few tries....

[Sound Intuition]

Can I ask what you intend to do with the aux mod? I have a 106+1 with the aux and have never used it.I think originally it was intended for use with the Nagra D.  I often thought I would pull the mod in favor of another channel.

[Michael P Clark]

At this point, this would be my first inline console and I probably don't have everything figured out completely on how many inputs/buses/sends I really need, or how to maximize this mixer to the needs it was built for. I've been dying to get my hands on an inline mixer and see how good it feels. I hate rotary knobs for studio/set gigs, and would love to get use to this style of mixing. I hope some people that use these mixers could comment on the real usefulness of some of the add-ons, if available still. I'm just looking at the options, no real plan with any of them, yet. At the price I'm getting it at I have room for add-ons, and just checking the possibilities. I'll probably have to put most of the room to cables for this thing.

[Guest jimg]

Michael,

You'll love it. There are many really swell features, like being able to switch inputs out of the mains and send them solely to the aux out. The monitor section is versatile and being able to route whatever is coming to the tape return to the A and B monitor can be helpful. Being able to shut off phantom power universally is also a great feature since it reduces power consumption so much.

You can put an additional input strip, an MS input strip or the Aux module into the empty slot. Since the mixers vary a little to a lot depending on the serial number Andy's help is essential. Installing an Aux module isn't a plug-and-play proposition, for example. Andy is great supporting all of his products. Call rather than email and you will get the help you need.

Best regards,

Jim

[Noah Timan]

Hi Michael,

I wouldn't recommend going the "aux module" route in this day and age -- I think if you truly need four busses then you should either save up for a 208 or pick something less expensive (01V, etc) as the 106 "aux module" way of creating a 4-bus is a bit needlessly clumsy in this day and age. 

That said, I'm not sure whose workflows really necessitate four busses in our line of work, so maybe I'm not the best one to ask.  In my cart workflow (which rarely changes all that much) I generally just use one bus (for a mono mix) and use the insert jacks to feed isos to my multitrack recorders.  That's it.  The whole mix gets fed to "left", and "right" and "aux" sit around getting unused -- let alone a separate "aux". 

Once in a great long while I have to make a secondary simultaneous mix for something and use the other bus, or do something in stereo and use both, and even more rarely it comes up that I want to do a simultaneous stereo ambience and mono mix and use all three of the 106's available busses, but it seldom comes up that I need four dedicated mix channels.  (If any of you out there are regularly performing four simultaneous mono mixes all day and every day at work, I'll buy you a probably well-needed drink next time I see you.) 

I have the stereo module in the "+1" slot and this allows me room for two extra channels -- a little clumsy when doing an eight-mic mono mix, but fine otherwise. 

At this point, this would be my first inline console and I probably don't have everything figured out completely on how many inputs/buses/sends I really need, or how to maximize this mixer to the needs it was built for. I've been dying to get my hands on an inline mixer and see how good it feels. I hate rotary knobs for studio/set gigs, and would love to get use to this style of mixing. I hope some people that use these mixers could comment on the real usefulness of some of the add-ons, if available still. I'm just looking at the options, no real plan with any of them, yet. At the price I'm getting it at I have room for add-ons, and just checking the possibilities. I'll probably have to put most of the room to cables for this thing.

[Michael P Clark]

Well, I have her....now to get use to her. I was shocked to see her SN is 315! Seems low.

Noah, SI,

My thoughts exactly. My only thought would be to run 4 channels to my 744t and create a 4 track ISO through the 4 mix busses, But then I wouldn't be able to learn the craft of "the mono mix" and would be "tracking" instead. Not my intentions with this mixer. Thanks for your thoughts everybody. I'll look into the Stereo Module though, that would give me the 8 channels I was looking for in the original post.

[mikefilosa]

I wouldn't recommend going the "aux module" route in this day and age -- I think if you truly need four busses then you should either save up for a 208 or pick something less expensive (01V, etc) as the 106 "aux module" way of creating a 4-bus is a bit needlessly clumsy in this day and age. 

Don't forget about the Cooper 306 -- it has 4 Busses too.  I've been very very happy with mine...

It also has this wonderful little DB25 on the back that packs out two mix tracks (L & R) and 6 prefade iso tracks (Lines 1 - 6), one for each input.  A packed, but tidy cable for a 4 - 8 track recorder...

Mike Filosa, CAS

Atlanta

[bcopenhagen]

...to learn the craft of "the mono mix".....

Yes! More power to you as you take on that bold quest...  What a sense of satisfaction when you nail a mix for a 2-page dialog scene.  People around you will wonder why you're chuckling to yourself after a take.  They think you're just another loopy sound guy, but you'll know it's pure giddiness.

Have fun with the new Cooper.

Brian

[Matthias Richter]

My thoughts exactly. My only thought would be to run 4 channels to my 744t and create a 4 track ISO through the 4 mix busses, But then I wouldn't be able to learn the craft of "the mono mix" and would be "tracking" instead. Not my intentions with this mixer.

I`ve got a 208 and a 744T as my recorder. So I use the 4 busses everyday to iso 1-8 inputs to 4 busses. I would prefer (like yourself) to do a mono-mix and iso all inputs in addition but having 4 tracks in total makes that rather complicated. Even with a scenario of 3 mics it is just not possible to route the third mic to track 1 (mix) and iso to track 4 without touching tracks 2+3 because with the 208 V1 you select your busses by paning the panpot. So wanting to go to bus 1+4 means you would have your pot in mid position and have selected the routing knobs 1+2 and 3+4. With that setup mic 3 goes onto all 4 tracks.

So until I have a multitrack recorder with 8 or even more tracks I won`t be able to do mono-mix and have the isos as backup. I know that sound mixer comes from mixing but unless you have learned the mixing in the days of mono-Nagra and feel comfortable without having the isos for the worst case then I rather deliver my boom(s) on track 1 and the radios following (with a little bit of mixing radios when having more than 3)

Cheers, Matt

[David Waelder]

A little off topic here-

A little known but very useful capability of the Cooper 106 is the ability to feed mix bus audio to two different recorders from the tuchel outs.

The tuchel connectors, as everyone knows, are set up to feed a Nagra and incorporate a resistor to level match to the Nagra line in. It does require going into the board with a soldering gun but that resistor can be removed to yield a regular line out identical to the outputs on the side of the mixer. I'm sorry, I can't help with the specifics but the repair shop at Location Sound has done the modification before. It's not very complicated or expensive.

Now, getting the second line out is a bit more of a deal. It seems that the sends and returns do not utilize all of the pins in the tuchel connectors. I had Neil Stone (regrettably no longer available) wire up a second bus out to the tuchels. I'm not sure exactly how he made the connections - one might have to question Andy Cooper regarding the best procedure.

New tuchel cables are necessary, of course. Or, better, wire up a tuchel distribution box that accepts the tuchel cables from the mixer and breaks out the signal to two sets of XLR cables.

Why go to all the trouble? Well, the result is that two recorders, say, a Deva and a Sound Devices, each receive a mix signal. The mix signal to each could be a Left-Right mix with booms and radios split, if you like. The regular L-R output on the side of the mixer is still available to feed a video camera. If there is no video camera, then the side outputs are clear and there are no nuisance cables to get caught if the mixer is pulled out in a drawer. Back in the days of Nagra and DAT, this arrangement even permitted having the tape return under switch control. That's no longer applicable, of course.

I bring this up because it's an easy modification to make and very convenient if you work with two recorders.

David Waelder