Teenage Engineering TX-6 Review: A Pocket-Sized Audio Mixer

At this point there’s small to accidental astir Teenage Engineering that hasn’t been said. Every reappraisal of the sleek Swedish audio brand's gadgets commences with a blistery instrumentality that yet underscores the aforesaid points: While their cogwheel is quirky and astonishingly expensive, it’s pugnacious to hatred what they’re doing erstwhile they bash it truthful well.

Within the synth space, and the broader realm of Very Online People who marque euphony betwixt bouts of doomscrolling, the Swedish gearmaker functions somewhat similar comedian Tim Robinson’s Netflix bid I Think You Should Leave. The last merchandise is proudly defiant conception creation that’s superb but besides benignant of annoying. It’s critically acclaimed, yet clearly not for everyone. And the memes that swirl successful its aftermath are axenic gold.

When compared to its brethren successful the brand's “Field” bid of ultraportable philharmonic devices, the TX-6 makes a compelling lawsuit for being the astir utile and worthy of its hefty $1,199 terms tag. At its halfway the TX-6 is simply a mobile USB-C interface and standalone mixer, with an awesome six stereo ⅛-inch inputs packed into a sturdy, handsome small portion that’s smaller than a platform of cards. Plug an audio root into 1 of the top-mounted jacks and the tiny black-and-white show asks whether you’re utilizing a stereo oregon dual mono source. Adjust highs, mids, and lows with the cutest small trim pots you’ve ever caressed, and the vertical sliders beneath set each track’s volume, which outputs to a ¼-inch jack astatine the bottommost of the unit.

A achromatic knob nether the show surface steps mildly arsenic you crook it near oregon close to set the maestro output volume. A click of the knob opens up an expansive paper of options similar tempo syncing, Bluetooth connectivity, and defaults settings for the transmission knobs. A brace of color-coded FX buttons toggle effects similar reverb, delay, and EQ, and the displacement fastener unlocks a satellite of paper diving that lurks beneath the TX-6’s tiny but mighty surface. The USB-C larboard offers a driver-free, class-compliant transportation to an iPad oregon the desktop instrumentality of your choice. It adjacent works seamlessly with an iPhone done USB-C to Lightning, via an MFi-certified connection. Insert a thumb thrust successful the USB-C larboard and you tin grounds a unrecorded stereo way straight to the thrust from the TX-6’s maestro mixdown channel. You’ll request to furnish your ain mic to seizure audio connected the alert with this method, but it’s a tad much applicable than the akin workflow you’d find connected the TP-7.

A Teeny Tiny Mixer

It’s nary astonishment the unit's diminutive size necessitates important tradeoffs that a accepted studio-based instrumentalist volition find annoying. Plugging successful a guitar oregon a accepted microphone requires a converter, and the integrative lodging of the mean ⅛-inch connector you’d find astatine Amazon oregon Guitar Center is simply a choky acceptable adjacent to the different inputs. Pair that with the deficiency of 48-volt phantom powerfulness for condenser mics and your champion stake is either a inexpensive lavalier mic with a built-in ⅛-inch output oregon a newfangled influencer mic similar the Tula oregon the Austrian Audio MiCreator. Teenage Engineering sells its ain connectors, of course, with prices ranging from $12 for a elemental ⅛-inch to ⅛-inch cable, to $19 for a stereo ⅛-inch to dual-mono ¼-inch cable.