I've been enjoying this thread over the last couple of months while the boss isn't looking over my shoulder

I'm still only up to page 32 though...
I just brought a Presonus ACP-88 compressor to use with my N-12. The compression on the N12 isn't bad but I just wanted to have a bit more control.
I'm pretty new to compressors (and mixers in general) but wanted to know if it's possible to use the compressor when doing a hardware mix? I noticed it's compressing when I first record into Cubase but I can't see / hear any difference when turning on the compression for a hardware mix.
Thanks