Back in the day before the absolutely huge options of interfaces available at affordable prices that we’re currently enjoying some people would actually get a small inexpensive mixing board and connect it up to a small audio interface so that they could get multiple channels of mic input for cheap. Nowadays, however, mixing boards are often both a traditional mixer and an audio interface with USB connectivity. But even with mixing boards pulling double duty with better quality than in the past, we still believe that most users don’t need this big of a device and can get away with a small, modern audio interface with often much better quality at a low price point and minimal desk footprint. Modern audio interfaces have clean, clear, low noise pre-amps (as do many modern desktop mixing boards) and are available anywhere from a single mic input up to 18 inputs while taking up very little precious desktop real estate. Mixing boards do offer some benefits, however. Usually each channel has its own input, gain control, pad button and line/mic selector (as do most interfaces), but also contains dedicated knobs for EQ, reverb, and even compression along with a nice fader for fine volume/level adjustments. You’ll also get bussing controls and sometimes a host of on-board effects beyond reverb, eq and compression along with some more complicated features that almost no streamer would ever need. The benefit of a mixing board is that you have physical controls you can actually touch. If you find yourself constantly adjusting your audio settings through a session (or others if you’re streaming multiple people or podcasting) it’s a decent way to go. But you can still do all of this “in the box” with an audio interface with software, and it makes it quite a bit more assured that you won’t accidentally turn something or the cat won’t walk over your mute or pad button. It’s our opinion that most people don’t need a mixing board. Get a good two-channel audio interface and you’ll most likely be set for whatever situation in which you find yourself. But if you really have the need for physical controls, EQ, and group effects control, it’s a good option for certain people. Also, if you just really want to flex, that’s okay too. Some audio interfaces do have a few features borrowed from soundboards, such as the GoXLR, but in general, we're going to focus on a select number of audio interfaces in this guide.  If you want us to do a similar guide to soundboards, let us know in the comments below.