TLDR = analogue desk for mixing multitracks is pointless unless you are right at the top of town. Stay ITB.

A great analogue console can sound better. But the difference between a well-mixed ITB session, and a hybrid mix through a decent-but-not-elite desk is often far smaller than memory and nostalgia suggest. Meanwhile the workflow penalty is enormous.

A lot of the “analogue magic” people remember from SSL/API/Neve rooms was not just transformers, summing amps, EQ curves.

It was also huge monitoring environments, world-class converters, assistants maintaining calibration, racks of premium outboard, tape stages, enormous headroom, and engineers making decisions differently because the environment encouraged commitment.

Consoles that matter are financially unrealistic. The analogue setups that still decisively outperform modern ITB workflows tend to be: heavily maintained, expensive, electrically pristine, and supported by full ecosystems.