Allen & Heath ZED-10

A really solid well made piece of kit. I bought this to replace my Motu 4Pre which although is also solid and has excellent sound, is difficult to physically control. Plus, I'm not a fan of virtual mixing boards. So it was a real pleasure to have tactile controls that feel good to operate. Used for speech and mixing/editing pre-recorded radio pieces it also allows me to attach 3 mics and a broadcast headset for live links to the broadcast studio via a Comrex BRIC-Link. The USB is connected to a MacBook Pro running Mavericks 10.9.4 and worked first time with no subsequent problems. Since gain on mics, for my purpose, is 'fix and forget', the need for sliders, and therefore a larger unit, proved unnecessary. There is also enough amp gain to cleanly power 'cold' mics like an EV20 and SM57 etc. Perfect for people like me who are not sound engineers and want an unobtrusive, intuative mixer on their desks. At the price, it's extremely good value for money.
UPDATE APRIL 2015: Now running on OS x Yosemite v10.10.3 with no problems encountered.

I looked for some small versatile mixer to be used with microphones on the drum set. I am usually sceptical when seeing so many positive reviews on item. But I must confirm that ZED-10 deserves for them. I did not heard better sound quality mixer in that range before. Equipped pre amps are absolute top notch and give perfect warm without EQ distortion especially on overhead microphones. This at least is worth the price of the unit. It has 3 range EQ available with possibility to swipe through mid range. Pretty useful for the selectivity within 'most busy" range of every instrument. It has USB port and is compatibly with most of DAW's. There is 2 track recording possible. It's a perfect mixer for the drummer using four microphones (bass,snare,overheads) configuration. It can be used also for small band, thanks to 4 XLR channels. But I would suggest to buy the ZED-10 FX version which has built-in effects.
Unit is very easy and intuitive in use. It's considerably heavy and well built. Unit is powered with typical 3 pin cable. No fancy incompatible power supplies which is a huge plus. There is 48V phantom power available for every channel
Well done Allen & Heath.

I was looking for a small portable desk that would work at home for mixing small recordings and would also be used in small live venues. In the past I have used an Allen & Heath MixWizard 16:2dx but this was too big to cart around all the time and I wanted something small that had similar quality.

I have been using this desk at least once a week since January and this desk fulfilled and surpassed what I needed.

The 4 Mono channels are excellent with a wide range of control, the sound is always very clean . The versatility of the desk is impressive. The multiple outputs and busses mean you can mix and record in multiple ways with a little imagination you can normally find a solution to most requirements. I have also found the documentation excellent the circuit diagrams are particularly useful.

I have not yet used the USB interface as I have generally used my ZOOM h4 for recording to save me carting the Laptop around but I like that fact that this is available.

The one thing I would like to have seen would be for the FX (2nd Aux) channel to be switchable pre/post fade but in something this small you cant have everything!!

The preamps and 24?bit conversion allow you plenty of headroom and a low noise?floor, and the ease of routing any channel to your computer is welcome. Though the EQ is limited in terms of control, it sounds good, and having everything presented in a single package like this is great. The 48kHz sample?rate limit is perfectly adequate for recording, though it may be a bit of a drag in some situations ? because, even though I don't see the need to record at rates higher than that, it means that you can't play back any 96kHz audio that was recorded elsewhere.

This criticism aside, I have to say that I find it very hard to fault this mixer. In fact, I'd thoroughly recommend the ZED10 FX as the ideal starting point for anyone wanting to get seriously into home recording ? and if you want to take things out on stage, it offers plenty of options for a small band there too. Just add a laptop, mic and speakers, and you're ready to go.