Rane MX 22
A 2-way stereo crossover with a mono sub output, 24 dB per octave filters, and an asking price that made the competition nervous.
Overview
The MX 22 is Rane's stereo 2-way crossover, a 1U rack unit built around 24 dB per octave Linkwitz-Riley filters. Rane's own advertising was blunt about it: the MX 22 "out-performs other brands that cost much more." That's marketing copy, not a verdict. It does tell you who the box was aimed at. This is the crossover for biamping a system properly without paying boutique prices.
The mono sub output is what separates the MX 22 from a plain 2-way crossover. You can split the signal into highs and lows for the main stereo pair and still feed a dedicated subwoofer, with no extra rack space and no extra power cable. Rane built the mono sub output into both the MX 22 and its 3-way sibling, the MX 23. It's a small, practical decision, and it points to a company thinking about real installs rather than spec sheets.
The filters are the other headline. The MX 22 uses 24 dB per octave Linkwitz-Riley filters. That's a steep slope, and it keeps the crossover region clean and keeps drivers from being fed content they shouldn't reproduce. Rane's literature ties this to phase behavior, claiming the 24 dB per octave approach "assures that your system remains in phase." Whether or not every listener can hear it, the engineering rationale is that the two halves of the system sum predictably at the crossover point instead of smearing it.
The chassis is 1U rack-mount, part of Rane's Mojo Series, the company's line of affordable rack products. Electronic Musician covered the Mojo Series launch and listed the Mojo Divider MX 22 2-way crossover at $299, alongside the $399 MX 23 3-way. The same write-up confirms the hardware: balanced XLR connectors, front-panel LED meters, 24 dB/octave Linkwitz-Riley filters, the extra mono subwoofer output, and an internal power supply. The internal supply means no wall-wart hanging off the back of the rack and no separate power brick to lose. At $299, that's a serious feature set for the money.
Rane's advertising in the mid-1990s positioned the whole Mojo line as American-made and inexpensive, and framed it as a direct challenge to "bargain" brands. Those are the company's words, not an independent finding. The claim was that Mojo would "outperform 'bargain' brands in every respect" while still being affordable. Owners argue about whether that held up in practice. The intent is clear enough: Rane wanted the MX 22 to be the crossover you reached for when the expensive stuff was out of budget.
The period press was warm. Pro Audio Review was quoted praising the MX 22 and MX 23 together as offering "a winning combination of great sound quality, functional controls and nice perks ... subwoofer out." That's a period review verdict, which carries more weight than the manufacturer's own ad copy. EQ (March 1997, p.53) ran a Mojo Dividers piece that framed the MX 22 and MX 23 as the finest crossovers Rane made, available "at a fraction of the cost of many others," and pitched them as the simple, smart way to biamp or triamp a system. Again, that's a period publication's framing rather than a lab measurement. It does confirm the market position of the MX 22: capable, affordable, and easy to operate.
Ease of operation is a recurring theme in Rane's own materials. The MX 22 is described as "easy-to-operate" and "extremely accurate," and the company clearly saw it as a working tool rather than a fiddly studio piece. You set your crossover points, check your levels on the LED meters, and get on with the gig. There's no menu system and no cryptic front panel.
The practical case for the MX 22 is straightforward. If you're biamping a stereo system and want to add a sub without a second crossover, the mono sub output does that job. If you want steep, phase-coherent filters rather than gentle 12 dB slopes, the 24 dB Linkwitz-Riley design delivers them. If you want balanced XLR I/O and an internal power supply in a single rack space, it has those too. Used, it sits where professional-grade Rane build quality meets a modest price.
Based on the available documentation, the MX 22 is not a flashy piece. There's no evidence of exotic components here. It's a functional, well-specified crossover from a company that built its reputation on signal processing. The Mojo Series was explicitly the affordable line, and the MX 22 was the entry point to Rane's crossover range. Plenty of working engineers would rather have a reliable, honest crossover than a temperamental showpiece.
The MX 22 shares its 24 dB per octave Linkwitz-Riley topology and mono sub output with the 3-way MX 23, so the two make natural companions in a rack. The MX 22 handles 2-way stereo splitting; the MX 23 handles 3-way. Rane also offered the AC 22, AC 22B, AC 23, and AC 23B crossovers alongside the MX series, giving buyers options depending on how many ways they needed to split the signal and what features they wanted. The MX 22 sits at the accessible end of that lineup.
For anyone considering one today, the MX 22's appeal is the same as it was in the mid-1990s: it does a specific job well, it's built to rack-mount standards, and it doesn't ask for much money. The internal power supply and balanced XLR connectors mean it integrates cleanly into a professional signal chain. The LED meters make setup straightforward. And the mono sub output remains the feature that distinguishes it from a generic 2-way crossover — a small thing that solves a real problem.
The MX 22 won't win any beauty contests, and Rane never pretended it would. By the accounts of the period press and the company's own documentation, it's a capable tool.
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