I have just spent a few hours looking at the Avantis and C3500. I believe both are considered under the dLive banner. The Avantis seems to be significantly cheaper than the C3500, but largely seems to be comparable in specification. And the screens are bigger on the Avantis.
What makes the C3500 so much more expensive? What do you get on top of the Avantis?
Also, it looks like out of the box, both seem to only use a single cable between console and stage box. This seems dangerous with no redundancy. Is there a way to have a two cable redundant solution.
PS. I don't really understand the options for digital connectivity yet so any pointers on this would help. I see Dante, S-Link, Waves, MADI, DX and I don't really understand them so need education on each, what each does, when to use each. That type of thing. Are there tutorials on this type of stuff?
Avantis is a different product line than D-Live.
For a more expensive console (something to adequately replace your SC48) one of the main considerations should be how many cards slots does it have?
Cards slots offer additional I/O options that are critical to many applications:
So some typical uses for card slots might be:
1) Dante or Madi might respectively be used to connect to a computer for multitrack recording and playback (more on playback later).
2) Dante for example might be used to connect additional inputs. For example perhaps your church utilizes tracks. For around $40 you can get a copy of Dante Virtual Soundcard which turns your computer into a 64 I/O interface. So over ethernet you could get multiple channels. The nicer Shure wireless units can also pass signal and interface with some consoles to give info (battery life etc).
3) Waves: This is processing, due to heavy lifting your console wouldn't be capable of on its own. I run 64 I/) and use it on most channels.
4) You might be connecting to multiple consoles for monitors or broadcast (there are cards for that) in the same brand or two a different brand might be different communication protocols (ie different cards).
5) You might want path redundancy to your main I/O. A card can offer that.
In this day and age budget allowing I think two is a good place to start; as that allows multitracking and something else. Avantis gives 2x card slots, and D-Live can have up to 5 with their largest S class system I believe.
If you are not familiar with multi tracking this is one of the greatest tools available today, and is an incredibly useful. It is great for training aspiring engineers in a more low pressure environment, it is also great for getting things dialed in. At the church I work at I record rehearsal (knowing the band will play things the same), and then I spend several hours dialing in the mix, and creating appropriate snapshots.
Hopefully that helps you understand card slots and additional I/O. This is one of the factors of the price difference, but there are many more.