Crest Audio Review: XR 20

History: Church rock / blues / modern rock / classic rock

Purchase: Don't know it was already there when I joined the church.

What I Like About This Crest Audio XR 20: For a small unit, it has lots of Aux sends (6) that can be set either as pre or post in groups of two. Two parametric midrange tone control per channel (plus treble and bass control)is useful. The sound is pretty clean. In my opinion it's cleaner than the Crest's larger HP 8 series board.

What I Do NOT Like About The Crest Audio XR 20: For a 20 ch board designed for live sound it makes you wonder why they didn't put a global mute switch. Every channel must be muted individually. There's no connector for lights. It's pain to use the board in a dark place. All the connectors are on its back side, so it becomes obligatory that you put it on a rack that has tiltable feature (which means more money). $ 2K price tag seems high in this day and age. You can probably find a comparable unit for lot less money.

Crest Audio XR 20 Quality Rating: Construction is solid. Quality seems high too. The unit we have is less than a year old, so we don't know how good it will put up to on the road usage.

Review Summary: If you must have six Aux (pre or post) send on a small rack mountable mixer, then this unit is definitely one choice to consider. By the same token, if you must have two sweepable midrange tone control, this unit has it.

Rating of this Crest Audio product: 3

This Crest Audio XR 20 PA Gear Review Submitted By: Hiuke

Review Date: 2006-04-27