A risky investment to be sure.
I assume you mean because it is behringer. Normally I would agree there. I think it is a good contender for this though. Get yourself two of these and two 16 channel TS, or TRS snakes and you have not only a monitoring situation but also something to submix on the fly with a hard disk recorder. All for about $250. Pretty good solution IMO. The fact that it is Behringer does mean of course that it could break pretty easy and possibly be noisey on any given channel. Since it is not part of the recording chain I would not worry too much about quality. Espessially keeping in mind that other solutions are gonna be a much bigger investment. Making something custum might still be a good solution though. I'll be mulling it over for sure.
Yes, the Behringer name pretty much assures you it will break and your only option then is to pitch it into the dumpster, as I'm sure you already know. There are certainly a few very worthy B products (the ADA8000 comes to mind, for sure) but for the most part B should ALWAYS be thought of as disposable gear. Buy the Ashly or the Rane, and you'll only buy one time. It will work for years. The Behringer might too, but it also might not. The "might not" odds are pretty much even money. The "might" odds are the long shot...
Anyway, I'm pursuing a custom solution at the moment. I've got someone who will help me build this thing - we'll see what the total cost ends up being. If it comes in at a decent price maybe we'll build a couple of them if anyone's interested.
Dirk
EDIT: Thanks Brad! Beat me to the punch!