Yes, it’s just a copy-paste job and is meant as an alternative model, not a mod job or to replace the Playdifferently Model 1.
Ahhh, to dream…
It wins the vote for “mixer controls most laid out like a TIE fighter”, but aside from that Yuk.
Big blank spaces, lop-sided channels, circa 1960 rotary controls are far too blind-elitist these days, and less than 4 channels is a waste of PCb and booth space now, with a lot of DJs adding extra inputs to their rigs.
But for a quick 2 minute cut and paste doodle of can a mixer look like a TIE fighter, ok
The PCBs in the Playdifferently Model 1 are vertical cards aligned with the channels, so it’s not wasting some horizontally-aligned main PCB board’s space if it were done this way. I agree there’s a bunch of blank work space, though plenty of rotary-heads complained about other ideas of rotary mixers as being too cramped and not having enough space around the main volume knobs.
This idea has 6 rear inputs, by the way, which would be matrixable to any of the three ‘work’ channels. I realize that’s a little weird considering the Model 1 has each rear input on each channel’s vertically-aligned PCB independently, but the intent of this copy-paste job was to show the functionality I’d want, not worry about how they would wire it inside.
If you like more than three channels and you don’t like rotary controls, then I guess go ahead and buy the Model 1, as it’s already a real mixer that’s being produced.
Another thing I’d like to see is a 3 channel (still matrix) version of the A&H Xone DB4 but called the DB3, but using the dLive 96bit/96khz DSPs instead of the iLive system. I’d buy that, too.
It loks nice, but would be better layed out and more channels. 3 channel mixers died naturally because of many reasons. A 4 channel mixer would do better function-wise and marketing-wise.
This mixer looks like the size of Xone 92, but has only 3 channels.
There is still room for improvement 
There are already plenty of 4 channel mixers on the market, though. I’ve never habitually mixed 4 channels at one time, rather I tend to max out at 3 channels at once even if I have four or more sources available at once. I think twice I’ve played four at once and didn’t particularly care whether I repeated it. If people want a Xone 92 rotary, get a Xone 92 rotary. There has never been a 3 channel matrix rotary mixer with more than four rear inputs, channel filters & meters, not huge, etc. The PMC-CX was huge and only four rear inputs. There was another smaller Vestax matrix mixer that was faders only, lacked channel meters, and still had only four rear inputs. If you put just four rear inputs on a mixer, you might as well just have four top work channels, IMO, as it’s sort of a waste of the matrixing potential. I also like to have a lot of gear hooked up at one time, so three digital decks and three phono turntables or two Prime digital decks with two layers each or three digital decks would all be situations that would work on this mixer. I also find the selection of the matrixing at the top of a mixer to be less confusing than an odd top channel that’s repeatedly not being used. I’m less likely to grab the wrong channel control, for instance.
The options on You idea are great, I like the filters and the parametric EQ in the middle, the idea is good, but the amount of channels available makes it a bit odd and will not be interesting from the sales point of view.
You do realize it’s based on a real mixer that exists that you and DJ_Sontag seem to be implying ought to sell well, right? If people want faders and more top work channels, the Model 1 already exists. I think it’s way too many top work channels for my brain to mix on easily and I prefer rotary volume controls. I’ve owned a couple Xone 62s over the years, and never really loved mixing on them. I started to think it was the shared filter assigns, the faders, and too many top work channels. Hence the reason I don’t own the Model 1… or even a Xone 62 anymore, for that matter. I even find the MP2015 to be a bit much at times… the DB4 basically always to be way too much. DB4 I get easily confused or distracted when I’m using it.
With all the respect, did You noticed, that You keep repeating Yourself? I understand, that You don’t need more channels. But You need to also be more realistic. How many mixers You think a company would sell that have only 3 channels? 100? 50? 20? Well, where is then the money return for the investment of building such a mixer? You don’t want to have this mixer also to be overpriced. If it would cost 2000$ it would be better to go for that Model 1 or Xone rotary…
I have no idea how many they’d sell. No one’s ever done a mixer like this before. Heck, I have no idea how many Model 1’s have sold.
As I see it, a lot of the hardware for this version already exists. The rear portion of the chassis. The bottom and sides. Much of the components inside. I’m curious how high the cost would be to go from the current vertical board layout to the alternate cards that have the Q and resonance controls or non-work-channel three other rear inputs, and then how they’d wire them together for matrixing. The dLive-based DB3 would probably be an easier design to pull off.
As for price vs going for the Model 1 or a Xone rotary, I wouldn’t buy either a Model 1 or a Xone rotary for reasons I’ve already given, and for the same price for either would buy such a design. I can’t speak for other rotary heads’ pricing preferences.
We all know, that if the mixer is worth to build it, some one will do it. Not many companies do the rotary mixers, because it is not cost effective. The amount of units sold this way is very small. Better to build a normal 4ch mixer and make faders replaceable to knobs - easy to build, cheaper and knob kits are an extra $ - win - win for Djs and manufacturers. But 3channell layout… Well, as I said, this kind of mixers died because of no interest from many djs. You actually are the first person I meet to even talk about 3ch mixers since last 10 years…
They’re building by hand a full 6ch boutique (non-matrixable) mixer with studio faders, though. That’s already low-volume and rarified.
There are so many four channel mixers out there from so many different brands that really I don’t see how four channel being so popular matters that much. You have a lot of demand but a lot of alternatives people can choose from for that segment, so they sort of cancel each other out. Short of, say, the ‘industry standard’ no one other model is going to take the lion’s share of the four channel mixer market all by itself.
The Model 1 is already kind of hard to market, in my opinion, to DJs that aren’t using a laptop with one of those DB25 connectors. It’s, IMO, a kind of weird hybrid unit designed for people doing live producing and possibly with other normal DJ gear added. However, there’s a lot of raw material on the Model 1 I think purist mix DJing could take advantage of if it was distilled down to something more useable for someone like me.
If You want to know my preferences, I would go for 6 or 8 channels even. 4 band EQ or Model 1 like channels with filters and parametric EQ is a dream for me, but also a crossfader (I do scratch a lot). A cool FX unit with XY pad maybe… That would be crazy, but cool, and usable on Stage, in the studio, in the club… But yeah… We all can dream
Lot of options to choose from already out there that are pretty close. A&H, Formula Sound, Pioneer now with the V10, etc. Rodec might even come close to those requirements. Just add an outboard FX unit to any of those but the V10 that already has one. No need to really dream for you. Just save up your money. If you can live without the 4-band EQ, there are even some cheap models out there.
Edit: Oh, parametric EQ. Well, that’s a little harder to find. The Tascam X-9 does that if you can live with only 4 channels. Weird semi-matrixing on it. Parametric EQ is actually the least important thing to me. The Model 1 already has it, so I was trying to work it into my thing. The resonance knobs were more important to me than that, but I figured I’d put Q on there just for the symmetry of it.
I personally would make the gain knobs instead cue send knobs that just send to the headphone, and then replace the cue selector knob with a three-way switch to cue, split, and master that selects horizontally in that order. I would also recommend providing both a master sum of the isolator and the ability to defeat each the summing selectively and go 2 or 3-way directly out of the isolator.
I’ve thought these through and decided to make it the old-fashioned way… the reason for this is that I already have a Formula Sound PM-90 which has all the functionality and sound quality in the same package.
Deja Vu. That sounds like something I might have posted on the net a few years back, actually. Cue send knobs instead of trim-gains would require a massive redesign of the circuits to pull something like that off, as you’d now require boost-over-unity on the bottom volume controls. I’ve considered that a feasible idea for rotary designs, though. If you already have boost-over-unity on the bottom volumes, then it makes sense. I have no problem with the idea of using the main isolator as an optional unsummed (selectable 1-way, 2-way, and 3-way modes) crossover (with requisite rear outputs) and have thought of such an idea on all these mixers with otherwise-pretty-useless main isolators, but I doubt they’d go for such a forward-thinking change… or rather retro Jamaican sound system idea. It would be nice to have.
The intent of this concept is to take the existing PlayDifferently vertical circuit cards with just added resonance & Q (additional or daughter cards?). They’d have to add cards with the rear, too, to get matrixing, anyway. I’d take this mixer as MS Paint copy/pasted even without the resonance & Q. In retrospect, I do use all four channels more now with a pair of Prime players in the way I alternate layers. I think a 3 channel matrix mixer would be more useful for me with three or more dedicated decks, like 3 Prime players with their B layers deactivated and some vinyl turntables hooked up.
I also have another mixer idea that would work even better than the above for both a 3 channel version, and also a 6 channel version, with a natural internal update using their existing gear, but I’m still trying to get that other company to pay attention to it 