Paired stereo tracks aren’t saved in scene memory on a CQ ! 100 scenes but you need a USB drive to save this in a “Show.” It’s simply impractical when you have to work with multiple bands live. My old Yamaha 02R from 1995 does it without a problem. From 1995! Over 30 years in the digital world is the Dark Ages!! Come on Allen & Heath, you can do better than this! This isn’t a request for a high-tech feature, it’s basic functionality.
Without commenting on the feasibility of whether this is a feature that we will or won’t add to CQ…
There’s a functional justification that is relevant here:
The show contains the entire functionality of the mixer. Setting up the show includes making everything ready for the show to happen, and can include function changes that interrupt the audio.
A scene is something that can change multiple times within a show. The functions that are included here shouldn’t interrupt the audio when they change.
Stereo linking channels (or unlinking them) reprograms the audio routes on the FPGA and doing so interrupts the audio briefly. For this reason, we don’t include them in scene changes.
SQ is the exception to this, as R&D worked out a way to make it function.
Just my 2 cents here…
I don’t think it is weird that the scene system doesn’t save information like this. As Mark has stated, the scene system doesn’t save anything that could disrupt audio when loaded. That would be a terrible thing to have happen by “accident” during a show.
What is weird IMHO, is the fact that on the SQ series and down, A&H has designed the consoles to only have enough internal storage for a single Show file. Honestly this is what is unacceptable IMHO. I’m not suggesting that these lower lines of consoles need the ability to save 500 unique Shows in memory like the Avantis and DLive allow for, but being able to save a few shows on the device (perhaps something like 10 shows on the CQ, 25 shows on the QU, and 50 or 100 shows on the SQ) doesn’t seem like too much of an ask. This will still create “differences” between the various “levels” of A&H products, but make all of them more user friendly. Given the fact that each Show file takes up just a few MB of space, adding the ability to save a few Shows wouldn’t take up that much storage.
Now I realize there is a really good chance that A&H simply made no provision for this “extra” storage space in these consoles and it would be cost prohibitive to redesign their PCB board and retool their manufacturing line to add it at this point in time. If this assumption is true, it’s really sad because A&H neutered the Show system of these consoles to save about $1 per console by leaving a 128MB memory chip out of their PCB design.
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Is that why you can’t save linked stereo tracks within a scene? To avoid a brief interruption in the sound? But who in the world, with these little consoles, changes scenes while a band is playing or music is playing? Do a survey to see the proportion of people who want to be able to save their entire mix versus those who want to avoid a brief interruption in the sound when changing scenes…
And even then, why can’t we save multiple “shows” internally? In 2026, you’ll need a USB drive? With all the compatibility issues, potential damage, and data loss… (or “where is my damn USB key?”).
It’s an incomprehensible design choice for an otherwise high-quality console.
First, you have to understand the A&H seeks to provide consistency between their products. Not only is it easier for customers to understand, it is cheaper and less resource intensive for A&H to be consistent with their programming, etc. across all models. This means A&H is going to treat Shows and Scenes the same way across all of their console models. This means a Scene file on the CQ is going to work basically the same way as a Scene file on the DLlive.
That being said, Scenes and Shows are two different things in A&H ecosystem (and other manufactures might use different terminology for this same functionality adding to the confusion). Let me explain how A&H has designed them to be used…
A show file is designed to be used for a specific event/show. The idea being that you save one Show file for each event. You will set up the console with routing, stereo channels/busses and other settings for that exact show and save those settings as a “Show” file. A Show file includes all of the console settings that aren’t designed to be changed during a show - primarily because it does break audio in the console as the FPGA chip is reprogramed. A Show file also includes all of the Scene files as part of the Show file. When you load a Show file, it loads/displays the Scenes saved for that Show which are likely different from the Scenes you saved for a different show/event.
A Scene file on the other hand is a “snapshot” of the console. It is primarily designed to be recalled during a show/event to change channel/buss levels, aux send levels, channel processing, FX settings, fader layouts, DCA (members and/or levels), mute groups (members and/or status), etc, etc, etc. The settings saved in the Scene file do not break audio when it is recalled so it is “safe” to recall these settings. I mentioned it above, but again these Scene files are stored as part of the Show file. When you load a Show file, it will load all of the Scenes previously saved with that Show. Again - the idea being that you customize a single Show file for each event. This customization might include utilizing the Scene files in different ways for that specific show and you definitely wouldn’t want to see Scenes from an unrelated Show on the system. Recalling a scene from a different event could be catastrophic for your current event.
It sounds like you are mixing up the functionality of a “Show” file in A&H world with the “Scene” file system that A&H actually uses. Again, A&H didn’t design the system so you would save one Scene per event. Instead they designed the system where you would save one Show per event.
Furthermore, just because you haven’t had a situation where recalling a scene during a show would be helpful, that doesn’t mean others don’t need this functionality. It is certainly more commonly used as you move up the A&H ecosystem. Many shows run by a DLive for example heavily use the Scene files to make console changes during the show/event - whether that be on a per song basis, or perhaps even multiple scene recalls during a single song.
Again, the problem is not with A&H’s concept/implementation of “Show files” and “Scene files”. The “problem” is that the CQ only allows for a single Show to be saved on the console itself. It has the ability to load other Show files, but those files must be saved on a USB drive. This means it is understandable why some people don’t understand the concept of a Show file because there is only one Show file memory slot available on the SQ and lower consoles (as explained in my previous post). It’s not surprising that people don’t even understand the concept of a Show file in the A&H ecosystem because their console doesn’t allow a person the opportunity to save more than one Show file directly on the console.
First of all, Brian, thank you for your interest in my post, but I don’t quite understand why you’re writing a novel to explain extremely simple things. I’m an old guy who’s been mixing for five decades, so I think I understand absolutely everything about these little CQ mixers.
We’re in the “Feature Suggestions” section, so I’m asking for something extremely simple, a basic function for digital mixing consoles: saving a track in mono or stereo to internal memory!
For example, at a gig where I have to do sound for a band with two synthesizers and an electronic drum kit, all in stereo, with stereo monitors, and then an hour later mic up a group of five singers, I’d like to be able to save tracks to the console, and it’s currently impossible! Really nothing extraordinary.
Sorry, but you’re wrong : the SQ v1.6 series can save stereo tracks in a “scene”.
And changing scenes mid-song with these small consoles doesn’t seem appropriate to me. We’re not talking about a show with video synchronization, fader automation, a light show, or pyrotechnics here…
We can discuss that if you want, timecode (LTC), MA Lighting, Disguise, or FireOne, but here, I’m just asking for the basics of a digital console: saving a configuration with stereo tracks and being able to seamlessly switch to mono tracks.
Once again, this is something I started doing 30 years ago on Yamaha 02Rs, I never thought I’d be asking this in 2026…
(Sorry if my English isn’t perfect)
I’m simply trying to be thorough. Obviously I have no idea what your level of expertise is, nor the level of expertise that OTHER readers of this post are going to have. If my answer is too “basic” for you, it might not be for someone else reading this that has the same questions.
That is a relatively new change that A&H recently implemented. For YEARS the SQ Show/Scene system worked the same way as all of the other A&H consoles and you couldn’t save a stereo channel setting in the scene manager.
Since this thread is about CQ I didn’t think it was that important to mention. After all, my post was already too long. But I guess you are mad that my post was both too long and too short at the same time… 
Clearly there are some people that you simply cannot help/please.
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Clearly, if I post in an A&H forum titled “CQ Suggestions,” it’s to point out to A&H the missing basic features, from the perspective of an experienced user (we bought five CQ20Bs for our small jobs to replace our Midas MR18s).
I wasn’t expecting any more helpful a response than A&H’s.