Behringer BCF2000 MIDI Controller

This post is a work in progress

The Behringer BC2000 MIDI controller is an awesome cheap piece of tech that I picked up for less than £100, more so for its motorised faders than anything else it had to offer.

Having an Akai Mpk249 its fully equiped to cover all my MIDI needs! it has rotary controllers and faders as well as switched a/b/c modes that give me 3 banks of virtual rotary controllers and faders to assign

A default as per usual 48 assignable controls! Pretty much identical to the BCF2000 and 99% of controllers out there.

Click the image to see the Studio build post

Check out the BCF2000 Spectrum analyser mod video at the end of this post to see how this patch looks when running!

Big thanks to MrSketi for allowing me to use his tune! Go check him out on Twitch! Awesome stuff! Production chat, challenges, plugin giveaways, gaming and much much more!
Go follow him over at https://www.twitch.tv/mrsketi

GO TO VIDEO

BCFview LCD monitor software

You get a little LCD overlay like this with bright white dot matrix style text

Its really helpful to have faders that automaticaly move to mixer track positions in my DAW, The only downside is you only get a visual representation of where you are along the mixer rack in banks of 8. The LCD seems to only display the first track number of each bank selected instead of individual track numbers.

BCFview.exe gives you a visual LCD representation across the faders and rotary encoders on the screen, It can be set to always on top and is a really handy tool.
DOWNLOAD HERE

BCF2000 setup for your DAW

Issues with drivers and Installation

There seems to be real issues with MIDI over USB using the 64bit drivers available on the Behringer website. I actualy spent quite a long time trying different setups and configurations to get it working via USB with no hope!
After a few goes over the last 8 or 9 months I had to accept defeat.
I’ve gone “old-school”, wired it up via MIDI cables straight to my Focusrite Scarlett 4i4 in Mackie Control Mode (Standalone mode “S2”) which you can find how to enable in the manual.

Click the link, when the behringer website opens up in a new tab just use the search function and type “BCF2000”
LINK TO MANUAL

MIDI Mode

The BCF2000 can be used in standard MIDI mode, Where you can allocate any of the buttons, faders or rotary controllers. You can assign CC, NRPN, MMC and many many more functions, please refer to the manual again as they are well documented there.
Depending on the way you connect your BCF2000 you may want to setup a basic profile on the machine itself, Then make your automation links in your DAW that way they will always work. Having a default profile you can revert to on the BCF means whatever project you open it the same midi mappings are there to work with again.
You can also reverse this process as the Behringer has a learn function. Its also worth mentioning the old Syx Dumps that can make for template making a breze!

BCManager is a good tool to do this, you can get it from www.mountainutilities.eu
It allows for template making, Syx Dumps and much, much more. its a fantastic tool for the BCF2000 if you want to take full advantage of its features.

Id like to remind anyone who is new to MIDI just how complex mapping can be. It can be a simple or as complex as you can imagine. The possibilities are endless and only your imagination can really be the limit of MIDI’s capabilities. Its a technology that is widely looked over these days.

Here is a setup in FL studio turning the BCF2000 into a spectrum analyser,

If you want to do this yourself you can simply frequncy split your incoming audio using the native FL plugin to 3 bands. This will allow you to move only 3 faders, si i then had to sub split these 3 bands into 8 bands so that i could move all 8 faders on the BCF2000.
I then assigned Peak Controllers to each of those subdevided bands, with a little tweeking to get the faders to move a little more realisticaly and not so agressibly using the Hi and Lo points and knee.

Click the link below to skip to the end of the post to check out the video!

GO TO VIDEO

Mackie Control Mode

Check back soon for a full description of how the mackie control mode works, which buttons do what, How to use the modifiers and get your faders moving!

A look inside the BCF2000

I have to say I always hear negative comments about Behringer, They seem to be in the market of manufacturing affordable equipment with lots of bells and whistles. Cheap and affordable gear. Ive never been let down by a Behringer product yet. It seems if you look after it, it looks after you!.
Looking at how this BCF2000 is designed it looks like a fair bit of thought went into it, neat PCB design, Power supply and outboard PCB’s look robust, everything on the boards looks in great shape. I can also say the belts have help up to the test of time!

Dissasembley isn’t straight forward and there’s definitely a technique to pulling it apart. First time was a little confusing for me because the placement of screws really doesn’t relate to the order in how this comes apart. There’s quite a number of fixings too!

Behringer BCF 2000 Tutorial-DIY-Repair-Open-Dissasemble-fix

I even found these mounting points with hardware which are not used in the BCF2000 but may be part of the BCR2000 or BCA2000 design?

Motors and faders

I was suprised to find pretty sizable motors, I guess being an older machine things tended to be bigger back then! i havent pulled it appart completely to see what kind of motors these are and i didnt see any writing on them either!
The fader drive mechanism is a simple and neat setup although it leaves me thinking it could of been improved perhapse with a simple soft tention guide. 3 of my faders died on messing around due to loose belts splipping off the motors.

The belts look in great condition. Still feel soft and have not degraded by the looks of it! Great news as replacements would mean custom and made to order!