Korg Zero 8 - WTB and Need your Advice!

[monoaural]

Hello to all,

i recently felt in love with the Korg Zero 8 and really considering to get one. As far as i heard, they are discontinued, but I might have found a shop still having new ones or i just get a used one.

The ideas is:

I would love to route all my equipment to a centerpiece. Which is an Octatrack, Monomachine, OP1, some Guitar FX, Shruthi-1 along with Ableton and/or Traktor.


So, what i like about the zero8:

- 8 channel mixer with integrated sound card.
- various routing possibility
- midi mapping possibility
- i love the space between the knobs, nice for tweaking. (Some other nice Mixers Allen & Heath Xone Series, i felt the knobs to close to each other..)

What I don´t like.

- no Korg support (firmware updates etc.) due to the mixer is discontinued
- i heard a lot of people reporting various issues (overheating, kaos pad issue). Some people even said, this was the reason for discontinuing this nice mixer. On the other Hand as always, People having Issues posting their stuff in forums, all happy users don´t.

I have firewire 800 port on my MBP. So i think a FW400 to FW800 cable should to the trick, right?!

MacBook Pro i7, osx 10.9

Altnernative for me would be
1. Allen & Heath Xone 4D -> sadly i feel the knobs are quite narrow to each other.
2. Denon DN-X1700

Are here some Korg Zero 8 users? Can you confirm the said Issues?
Would you guys (re-)buy a Zero 8 nowadays, in 2014 or is it kind of obsolete?

I was inspired by this super nice video interview. For me, one of the best i´ve ever seen... enjoy!




And please let my know what you think guys.

Thanks for your help.

[the_bastet]

I love the korg zero series. BUY IT!

[monoaural]

Do you own yourself? Any issues sofa?

[michael133]

i would buy again should i get back into djaying over production i only sold mine end of last year as im living in student accomodation and dont have the space for the mixer and my keyboard and synths to all be setup in nice reach of me sat at my desk

[monoaural]

@michael,

thanks. for the fast reply. did you had any issues during the time you owned it?

[michael133]

like i said in my personal message to you earlier no i had no issues with it whilst i was an owner

[stancollins]

Hi monoaural.
I have a Zero 8 and a 4d
Route 4 external synths and Machinedrum through the Zero 8 with no issues.
You will have to watch if you buy one that the screen works perfectly as some settings are only available via the screen menus.
Like adding extra input gain to the channels.
There are a few posts on the Korg forums that will give you more info.
I have been trying to buy a second one for some spare parts in the future.
Also be aware the knobs are closer together on the Zero 8 than a Xone4d and the sound on the 4d wins hands down.
Hope this helps.

[monoaural]

like i said in my personal message to you earlier no i had no issues with it whilst i was an owner

ah, yeah, i just saw your PM, sorry for this double-quaestion and thanks again for your help.

[deejaysoul]

I have the Zero4, and I had now for a few years with little, though it does live on top of shelf since I picked up the Z2. I think the Zero series is the most under rated mixers and were ahead of its time. The FW800 to FW400, wont be an issue.

[Duros]

I really like the Korg Zero's I've got a Zero 4 now and really like it. The only downside of the controller is that the pots sit very close to each other, I wish they would make a MKII version of the with a little more spacing between the knobs. But mixing still goes fine, since I don't really trow around with the EQ's.
The Zero 8 is also very nice, it offers 2 Send/Returns and some nice X/Y pad effects but don't expect that the all sound perfect.
Booting up the mixer does take a while sometimes (don't know why). And like the Zero 4, the knobs does sit close to each other.

But after all, very good mixers for a very nice price. They are really under rated.