I am looking to spend around three hundred dollars on at least an 8 channel mixer.On ebay there are a bunch of the soundcraft spirit folio series in my price range but there is also an older soundcraft 200 B.Which one of these are better, or are neither of these good, anyone have any suggestions.Thanks.bob.

I've used lots of Soundcraft mixers in both live and studio applications over the past decade and can relate the following:

Get the more recent models because Soundcraft does improve their gear with regularity and those improvements have historically filtered down from the high to low end offerings. The 200B is a 20+ year old board, which is well constructed but will most likely exhibit worse performance characteristics (noise, reliability) in comparison to even the low end recent Spirit stuff - not to mention the crap shoot involved with getting old electronics in questionable states of repair.

The advances in IC and low cost surface mount technology has brought extremely low noise and distortion audio products down to pretty affordable prices. For example, the Spirit Studio mixers of a decade ago had pretty decent audio paths for the time, but the Ghost improved upon the mic pres and those pres are now in the low end Spirit line. Basically, the small Spirit mixers are portable, reduced feature versions of the previous higher end Soundcraft gear.

I had a Folio mixer for about 3 years and was very pleased with the performance for home recording and live sound. For around the price of $400 new, I could not have gotten a better mixer with 8 mic pres and 20 total inputs. I had not a single problem with the board, and despite it's slim profile and very light weight, it was reliable and durable if properly handled.

Never used a Folio, so can't comment.

But I have a Spirit Studio 8-group desk that I have never had a problem with. The electronics are reasonably clean and quiet.

As far as that 200B goes: I've never heard anything but good about them, and its modular construction is a _definite_ advantage. I'd say you'd be better off with the 200B than with a Spirit Folio.