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Acoustic Treatment vs. Digital Room Correction

Joe Gilder — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 22:00:06 +0000

Photo by yimmy149

A while back I had the pleasure of attending a seminar given by Gavin Haverstick
of Haverstick Designs. The topic of the seminar was how to measure the acoustic issues of your room. He talked about various measurement techniques and devices.

All of this was very interesting, but the most fascinating part for me was during the question-and-answer section at the end. Someone in the audience asked Gavin to give his opinion on digital room correction.

Let me take a step back and explain what I mean by “digital room correction.” There are several products on the market now that can tune studio monitors to the room they are in. For example, if the room is causing a boost at 200 Hz, these products will use a digital EQ to attenuate 200 Hz. The end result is (ideally) a flat frequency response.

The way these products go about measuring the room is by using an omnidirectional measurement microphone to “listen” to the room while the system generates white or pink noise through the studio monitors. Since the generated noise has the same amount of energy (or volume) across the frequency spectrum, the system can then intelligently “hear” when certain frequencies are being either boosted or cut by the acoustics of the room.

There are three main products that come to mind that incorporate digital room correction:

JBL LSR 4300 and 6300 series of studio monitors – These are very nice studio monitors with room correction DSP built into the speakers themselves. They ship with a measurement microphone for tuning the room.
IK Multimedia ARC (Advanced Room Correction) System – This is a plug-in designed to be inserted on the master fader of your DAW, just before the audio is sent to the studio monitors. It ships with a measurement microphone, and it stores the room correction settings inside the plug-in itself.
KRK ERGO (Enhanced Room Geometry Optimization) – This is a hardware box designed to go between your audio interface and studio monitors. It employs the same basic principle as the other two options above, but it simply does so in a hardware box, rather than in the speakers themselves or as a plug-in.

The audience member who asked Gavin about room correction actually owns a pair of JBL LSRs, but he has no acoustic treatment in his home studio. He was basically wanting to know if he could “get away with” just using the room correction feature on the speakers without buying any acoustic treatment.

Two Parts of Acoustics

When talking about acoustically treating a room, we need to look at two different aspects of sound. You can’t focus on just one and negate the other. Likewise, correcting one won’t fix the other. Those two parts are the frequency domain and the time domain of sound.

Frequency Domain

This is the most obvious side of acoustics. We’re all searching for this fabled “flat frequency response.” We know that the size and shape of a room contributes significantly to the frequency response of the room. Ergo (forgive the pun), we must address those frequency issues by altering the frequency response at the source.

This is done with some sort of equalizer. In the past, engineers attempted to do this buy using some sort of graphic EQ. They would send the outputs of their mixing console through an EQ, which they tuned by ear, out to their studio monitors.

Today we have very accurate products, such as the once listed above. These digital products can EQ a signal with surgical accuracy, but is that enough?

Time Domain

Sound travels fairly slowly (as opposed to light). It only travels at around 1,130 feet per second. We’ve all experienced this. Two football players hit each other on the other side of the field, and you hear the sound of the collision slightly after you see it.

While it’s not as obvious, the same thing happens in a studio environment. The sound leaves the speakers and bounces around the room. The problem is this. To accurately hear studio monitors, you need to hear them by themselves, without any reflections from the room.

This is why manufacturers measure their speakers in an anechoic chamber, a room that allows for no reflections.

If we are in a large enough room, we can clearly hear the direct sound from the speakers and differentiate that from the delayed sound that is bouncing off of the back wall. However, in most home studios, the room is fairly small, and most reflections happen rather quickly.

Our brains aren’t capable of distinguishing between these early reflections and the direct sound from the monitors. In fact, according to Gavin, any sound that reaches our ears within 50-80 milliseconds of the original sound gets interpreted by our brain as the original sound.

For example, if you have your studio monitors in front of you, and you play a snare drum through them, you’ll first hear the direct sound of the snare. A few milliseconds later your ears will hear the sound after it bounces off the walls to your left and right and also the ceiling above you. Since the walls and ceiling are fairly close, your brain will combine these early reflections with the original sound.

The result? Well, let me ask you this. What if you took a snare track in Pro Tools, duplicated it, and delayed the second track by a few milliseconds. What would you hear? The two tracks would be out of phase with one another. Whenever signals are out of phase, all sorts of issues occur, such as comb filtering (where certain frequencies get cancelled out).

The difference in sound will be rather subtle, but imagine this difference across an entire mix! All those frequencies will be reaching your ear at slightly different times. The result? A very fuzzy mix with little detail.

Conclusion

The problem with digital room correction is that it only addresses the frequency domain. Depending on the room, they may do a rather good job. However, if your room is causing a 30 dB cut at 100 Hz, these digital systems won’t be able to fix this. Most of them can only boost the signal by something like 6 dB, which isn’t enough to cover the 30 dB lost by your room acoustics.

As far as the time domain goes, I think it’s obvious to note that no amount of EQ will fix this problem.

I’ve used both acoustic treatment and the IK Multimedia ARC system. My findings? I heard an immediate difference as soon as I put up some acoustic foam to the left and right of my speakers. The sound was instantly tighter and more defined. With ARC, there was a difference, but it wasn’t as dramatic.

The goal of this article is not to sway you from digital correction products. They can be a valuable tool in helping create an accurate mixing environment. I love the JBL LSR monitors. They sound amazing, even without any room correction. Digital room correction, when added to acoustic treatment, can be very effective. However, nothing…I repeat nothing…can replace the need for acoustic treatment.

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3 Ways to Kill Your Monitors’ Stereo Image

Joe Gilder — Fri, 15 Jul 2011 15:00:00 +0000

Home studios aren’t perfect.

In a perfect world, your home studio would be designed by a professional. You’d have a great-sounding control room, a couple of tracking rooms, and a nice, quiet vocal booth.

Raise your hand if your control room, tracking room, and vocal booth are all the same room. (Joe quickly…and sheepishly…raises his hand.)

That’s the reality we face. We’re weekend warriors, home studio recordists. Hobbyists. We’ve got to make the best of what we’ve got.

One of the casualties of a less-than-perfect room is your studio monitors’ stereo image. What’s stereo image? Simply put, it’s how wide your music sounds, coming out of your monitors.

As you might have guessed, your room (and the stuff IN it) plays a big role in how good your monitors sound. It can also severely effect the stereo image.

To be a bit tongue-in-cheek today, I’ll share with you 3 ways to KILL your monitors’ stereo image.

If you’re into bad-sounding music, by all means do the steps below. The rest of you should avoid them.

1. Don’t acoustically treat the side walls

One of the easiest and quickest improvements I made to my monitors’ stereo image was when I placed some simple absorption on the side walls (to the left and right of the speakers).

IMMEDIATELY I could hear things much more clearly. It was almost as if I was listening in mono before. Wild.

2. Place obstructions next to the monitors

One of my readers, Binu, commented a while back on my home studio tour video. He said:

Hi.. Joe.. nice arrangements. Please put your rack into floor, I think it will obstruct the sound from your monitor.

By the time I read that, I had already figured it out, but he was absolutely right. I had my equipment rack to the right of my mix position. It was obstructing the sound waves from being absorbed by the treatment I had placed on the side walls.

The results was an off-center stereo image. Everything sounded like it was panned slightly to the left. (Talk about ANNOYING.)

I moved the rack back behind the monitors, and everything was good again.

3. Don’t center the monitors

You’ve got no chance of a good stereo image if you don’t center your monitors along the wall in your room. If they’re in the corner, forget about it. You’ll never get a clear stereo image.

Which of these tips are you going to apply to your studio TODAY?

[Photo Credit]

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Day 8 – Get the Most Out of Your Studio Monitors [31DBR]

Joe Gilder — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 15:00:00 +0000

Welcome to Day 8 of 31 Days to Better Recordings.

Once you get all these amazing tracks recorded, you’ve got to mix ‘em right?

Right.

Recently I was hosting a live Q&A session. One of the attendees asked, “What’s the point of mixing? Once you have everything recorded, you just blend them together and you’re done, right?”

While mixing IS a fairly simple concept (combining multiple tracks down to a single stereo track), it takes a lifetime to master. Mixes I’m doing today sound a lot better than mixes I did a few years ago. Three years from now my mixes will sound even better (I hope).

So, we can agree that mixing is important. If that’s true, then your studio monitors are equally as important, since you’re listening to everything through them.

You need to make sure you’re using decent studio monitors. Obviously. If you’re using $20 computer speakers from Walmart, you’re probably not hearing things very accurately.

That said, even if you only have “okay” studio monitors, there are things you can do to make them sound as good as possible.

1. Mopads

A while back I did a review of Auralex Mopads. Check out that review for complete details.

In short, mopads are monitor isolation pads. They’re designed to go between your monitors and the surface on which they’re resting. This helps to decouple the speakers from, for example, your desk.

When the speaker produces sound, those vibrations can travel from the speaker to the desk, and cause the desk to resonate at a particular frequency. This causes the low frequency response of the speaker to seem undefined, or perhaps even a little thin.

Placing a $40 set of Mopads under your monitors will create a night-and-day difference in how they sound. I know, I know. I was skeptical at first, too, but then I tried it. Great stuff. Suddenly the speakers had a deep low end and sounded very tight.

2. Acoustic Treatment

I’ve talked about acoustic treatment already (on Day 4), but it deserves another shout-out whenever talking about monitoring.

In addition to Mopads, proper acoustic treatment is a HUGE factor in how accurately your speakers (and your room) reproduce your recordings. Great speakers in an untreated room will only yield mediocre results.

Why? Because the room lies. It takes the sound that comes out of your speakers and changes it before it gets to your ears. Acoustic treatment helps minimize this.

Even if you can’t spend a lot on acoustic treatment, even a $100 box of foam will make a noticeable improvement.

Some recommended reading:

Day 8 Challenge

Today’s challenge is to carve out an hour of time in the next day or so to sit down in front of your monitors and listen to one of your favorite albums in its entirety. Take notes on what you hear. Make a mental note of what these songs sound like through your monitors.

Oftentimes, we get so caught up in trying to make our mixes sound great that we forget to remind ourselves what good mixes sound like through our monitors. Regularly listening to professionally-produced material will help combat this.

Report back here and leave a comment below. Let us know what you learned.

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Headphones: To Mix or Not to Mix

Joe Gilder — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 15:47:05 +0000

Two days ago I asked you, “Do You Mix With Headphones?”

You posted some really interesting stuff. Here are a few of my favorites:

David S.:

i cater to the most popular form of listening. so far, i’ve found that mixing to headphones and then listening on speakers has worked. i’m not rick rubin, but neither is anyone else who is not rick rubin.

Dave:

I do the main mix with Sony MDR-CD180 headphones, while checking with iPod buds, little Logitech laptop speakers and finally in my car. Between those, I can pretty much get it in the ballpark. I must be doing something right – on my last CD, even my most pickiest of listeners actually commented on how good it sounded. (excuse while I break my arm trying to pat myself on the back )

Those both made me laugh out loud.

If you haven’t had a chance, go through the comments and read them. There are some really interesting perspectives. And definitely leave your thoughts as well. Discussions are always helpful.

Pros

Let’s talk about some benefits to mixing with headphones.

1. Less-than-ideal Mixing Environment

As you read through the comments, you’ll notice that there’s one central theme. Most people that use headphones do so out of necessity. If they had a properly treated acoustic environment with nice studio monitors, they would likely use those. But since they don’t have a great mix room, they revert to headphones.

I’ve talked quite a bit on acoustic treatment in your home studio. It’s absolutely a necessity for both recording and mixing. However, some people just can’t afford to properly treat their entire room. They may only have enough money to treat a portion of the room to allow them to get a nice, clean recording.

When it comes to mixing, though, frequencies are flying all around the room. There are huge peaks and dips in the frequency response of the room itself. (My room, for example, has some serious issues in the 120-160 Hz range.) All this craziness can make it very hard to get consistently good mixes. Acoustic treatment will help “flatten out” the frequency response of the room.

Headphones, on the other hand, don’t need acoustic treatment. They sound the same every time.

2. Increased Detail

Most people would agree that you can hear more detail on headphones than on studio monitors. I always use headphones for editing, for example. I want to make sure I don’t miss any pops or clicks in cross-fades, etc.

When mixing, headphones can give you an added amount of detail with things like EQ, compression, panning, effects (reverbs, delays), level balance, etc.

3. Keeping Things Quiet

Obviously, many of us live with other people, or in dorm rooms or apartment buildings. Also, many of us have day jobs, which makes “studio time” synonymous with “late nights.” When I first got the studio monitors I have now, I was living in an apartment, and I could only work on music at night. I was so bummed, because I never had a chance to try out the monitors, since they would wake the neighbors.

Cons

And now for some down-sides to mixing with headphones:

1. Limited or Exaggerated Frequency Response

One of the reasons we get big 6-inch or 8-inch studio monitors is so we can actually hear what’s happening in the low end.

Headphones typically cannot reproduce the lows the same way that studio monitors can. After all, they’re small little mini-speakers, so we can’t expect them to thump like a 12-inch subwoofer.

Sometimes headphone manufacturers make up for this by boosting the low end in their headphones. This isn’t necessarily wrong, but you need to keep this in mind when mixing on headphones. Since they probably don’t have a super-flat response, you need to know what the headphones are doing to your mix as you make your mix decisions.

2. Altered Stereo Image

When you’re mixing on studio monitors, when you pan something hard right, you’re still going to hear it in your left ear. The sound will travel from the right monitor, past your face, and into your left ear.

With headphones, this doesn’t happen. If you pan something hard right, it’s only playing in your right ear. This isn’t necessarily bad, but you might choose to pan things differently when mixing on monitors vs. headphones.

Also, the “center” of your mix is very different on headphones. When listening on monitors, anything panned to the center sounds like it is in front of you, between the monitors. With headphones, anything panned to the center sounds like it’s in the middle of your brain. This may seem like a non-issue, but it can effect how you handle things like lead vocals, bass, kick, snare…anything panned to the center. The lead vocal might sound great on monitors but WAY too loud in the headphones. Gotta find a balance somehow.

3. Lack of the “Wow” Factor

There’s something awesome about listening to a mix blaring loudly on a nice set of studio monitors. No matter how good you are at mixing on headphones, you’re really missing out if you never listen to your mixes on monitors. You need to be able to crank it up and enjoy. For one thing, it’s just fun. Secondly, it’s a great way to check for issues in your mix that you can’t hear at lower volumes with headphones.

A word of caution, don’t listen at super-loud volumes, whether you’re using monitors or headphones. Listen at a “reasonable” level and protect your hearing.

Final Thoughts

So, that’s my take on mixing with headphones. I don’t think there’s a right or wrong answer here. You really need to evaluate your current gear, room, experience, and budget. If you can treat your room and get some nice monitors, great!

If you don’t have a dedicated studio room, or if you’re constantly mixing in different environments, it might be worth your while to get some nice headphones.

What do I do? I’ve had the pleasure of moving several times over the last year, and each room I’ve used for my studio has sounded very different from the one before. Since they’ve all been temporary, I haven’t been able to really dive in and treat them. So, I use a decent amount of acoustic treatment. However, the room still has some issues.

So I use headphones to give me a “room-less” mixing environment. I mix for a while on headphones, then I mix for a while on monitors. I’ve found that if I make major decisions with headphones and then “check” them on the monitors, it tends to translate much better than the other way around.

The biggest take-away point here is that you need to learn how YOUR system sounds. Even in a less-than-ideal mixing environment, you can get good mixes. You just need to know how to compensate for any problems your system brings to the table.

This is a long learning process, but it’s well worth it. Let me know what you think by leaving a comment.

[Photo by Paul.Carroll]

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Do You Mix With Headphones?

Joe Gilder — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 16:12:49 +0000

Over the last few weeks I’ve been asking you, my cute little readers, a couple of questions, such as:

You guys give some really great answers, so let’s do it again, shall we?

How do you mix your songs? Do you use headphones? Do you use studio monitors? Are you a 90% monitors, 10% headphones kinda guy? Are you 100% one way or the other?

I talked about this briefly in the latest podcast. I’m particularly interested, since I’m working on mixing my album right now. I can definitely see the pros and cons of both methods of mixing. I’ll post my thoughts in a day or so, but FIRST, I want to hear from you.

Leave a comment. Tell us if you prefer headphones, monitors, or both. Also, be sure to tell us why.

[Photo by skippyjon]

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Check Your Mixes EVERYWHERE

Joe Gilder — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 15:00:41 +0000

Right now I’m sitting in my studio. Later this afternoon I need to do a final mix-down on a song. Everything is pretty close to where it needs to be. Now it just comes down to the final tweaks, automation moves, etc.

However, before I can smile and say, “Done!” I need to check my mix on as many systems as I can. You can never check your mixes enough.

Before I go any further, check out this picture. I’ve got a few different monitoring options. How many do you see? We’ll see if you’re right at the end of this article.

Why You Need to Check Your Mixes

Who cares what the mix sounds like through the boombox or in the car? As long as it sounds good in the studio we’re done, right? Wrong.

Your studio is unique. It’s like a snowflake, or a fingerprint. You’ve got a specific, one-of-a-kind combination of studio monitors, room dimensions, and acoustic treatment (or lack thereof). If you play the exact same mix in 100 different home studios, it will sound different in each one. Your job as a mix engineer is to predict these differences and accommodate for them as best you can.

The problem is that your room could be lying to you. Let’s say your mix has a HUGE, annoying build-up at 100 Hz. However, let’s also say the dimensions and acoustics of your room are causing a huge dip at 100 Hz in your room’s frequency response.

(Ideally your room’s frequency response would be perfectly flat. Sadly, that’s really never the case. Even high-end facilities have certain problem frequencies.)

So, you’ve got a mix coming out of Pro Tools with a huge boost at 100 Hz. When this mix is played in your room with a huge dip at 100 Hz, everything sounds fine. Your room is behaving like an EQ. Sound great, right? It’s not. Like I mentioned before, your room is lying to you.

You’ll bounce this mix, take it out to your car, and BOOM!…all you hear is 100 Hz. The acoustics of car are different than your studio, and you can hear that 100 Hz loud and clear…and the headache ensues.

Do you get what happened? The 100 Hz was ALWAYS there, you just couldn’t hear it because your room was getting rid of it.

This same scenario can happen ALL across the frequency spectrum. What sounds smooth in your studio sounds harsh in your living room but boomy in your car, etc. etc.

There are more than acoustics at play here. Keep in mind that every speaker/headphone system reproduces sound differently. If your speakers don’t reach down to 40 Hz, you need to listen to your mixes on something that does, just to make sure that there’s not a lot of craziness going on down there.

Needless to say, to do all of your mixing without ever listening on another system is simply unwise.

How to Check Your Mixes

This really isn’t a secret or anything profound.

First of all, in the studio, try to use as many different speakers and headphones as you can. How many do I use? Four. Here are the answers from the picture at the top of this post:

M-Audio EX66 – my main studio monitors
Roland speakers – I don’t even remember the model number, but these are cheap secondary speakers. They give me an idea of what my mix will sound like on bookshelf speakers.
HD280 Pro - My headphones of choice.
Apple earbuds – Obviously we want to know what our mix will sound like through these.

With my 003, I’m able to monitor all of these independently, without needing to plug/unplug anything. It’s pretty nice.

As far as checking your mix outside the studio, you simply burn it to a CD or upload it to your iPod and hit the town. Take note of the differences you hear and try to come back to your mix and adjust accordingly.

Got any tips of your own? Leave a comment!

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Ask Joe #10 – Gear Rentals, Active vs Passive Studio Monitors, & Printing Instruments & Effects

Joe Gilder — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 14:00:30 +0000

Photo by takomabibelot

I had a nice handful of questions this week. Three to be exact. Let’s dive on in.

Question #1

Shawn wrote:

Hi Joe,
I am recording a instrumental jazz/bossa nova piece with classical guitar. I have a mbox2, AT 4033, MXLV69, AKG C1000S, and a Universal Audio 2610. Should I rent a mic or a to d conv and go digital in on the mbox. I have no space and like the acoustics of my bathroom. What would be the best option for the limited budget. A U87 is $30 a day. The rosetta I think 800 is $100 per day.
Thank you so much for your time.
Website: shawnfleming.com

Great question, Shawn. First of all, kudos on the Universal Audio 2610!! That’s a great preamp. While you have some nice microphones, I think it would make more sense to rent a really nice mic to go along with that really nice preamp. At $30/day, it wouldn’t be too hard to rent a pair of U87s and get a phenomenal recording.

I have to admit, I’m drooling a little at the thought of the U87 matched up with the 610 preamp. Great combination.

While there are better converters out there than what’s on the Mbox2, the Mbox converters aren’t bad. If it was me, I’d get the better microphone(s) first, then move my attention to converters.

Question #2

Krem Osle wrote:

Hello Joe,
I’m looking for a good pair of monitors based on what you recommend on your 12 studio necessities guide. However, as I was searching for a good brand and reviews and all that, I found out about passive and active monitors. I read that with passive I would need an AMP but actives do not need that since they supply their own power. Multiple sites mentioned that both are the “schnitzel” and I just gave up researching. Joe, what is YOUR recommendation?
k.
Website: http://kremstudios.com

Thanks Krem. Originally, all studio monitors were passive. You would buy a nice power amp, and run wires from the back of that into a pair of passive monitors.

Now, you’ll only find a handful of passive monitors. The overwhelming majority of studio monitors out there today are active, meaning (like you said) they have the power amp built in.

I prefer active monitors for three reasons:

Since almost all of the studio monitors are active, you have plenty of choices.
Since the amp is built-in, you know that it is matched perfectly with that speaker. You don’t have to worry about matching a power amp to a set of speakers.
They’re just easier to use – no need for an amp, speakers, and all the cables to connect them all to your recording equipment.

There’s nothing wrong with passive monitors. Pair them up with a good amp, and you’re in great shape. However, there just aren’t that many options. I can count on one hand the various passive models out there that I am aware of. However, I could go on for days listing out all the different active monitors.

Good luck, Krem!

Question #3

Gregory Marquez wrote:

I have a question about a set in protools. I have a track that I have been working on and I feel the track is progressing well. For the most part I have been successful introducing instrument tracks to the session and then selecting the RTAS to play. To be more efficient I convert the RTAS over to a wave file by creating a new audio track and then placing the instrument and audio track on solo and record the .wav version of the instrument thus saving computer cycles. For reason that are beyond my comprehension and for everything that is holy and good in the world my audio track will not pick up any of the instrument track even when putting them on solo. To add to this twisted mystery is the fact that when I select the audio track it plays the first instrument on the session however it will not record it. Either way ,, it is clear just by reviewing the session that what ever audio track I put in it will not pick up any internal RTAS players … it has no problem picking up my Korg Triton when i hit the local
control. To check my systems I opened a new session to check to see if the problem would resolve itself and it did. This tells me the set somewhere is wrong however I am unable to locate it. I have a finite amount of hair upstairs and this problem is putting me over budget. Any advice?????

Website: www.binge-records.com

Hi Gregory. That sounds like a headache for sure. To summarize, you’re trying to record an instrument track to an audio track, so you can then deactivate the instrument track and save on the extra computer processing it takes to play back the instrument. Am I right? If not, leave a comment, and we’ll discuss it further. Otherwise, I’ll go ahead and answer, since this is a great topic.

Not all computers are created equal. Some of us can play back seemingly endless tracks with hundreds of plugins. Some of us can’t get more than 4 instruments playing at once.

For those of us with slower computers, you’ll need to “print” your instruments and effects. In other words, you need to record these instruments and effects to a new audio track. That way you can turn off the processor-intensive plugins and simply play back the audio (which is much easier on your computer).

To do this, simply set the output of the first track to a bus, something like “Bus 1″ or “Bus 17-18.” Then, set the input of your new audio track to the same bus. Record-enable the new track and start recording! That’s it.

Gregory, I’m not sure why you’re soloing the track. I think perhaps you don’t have things routed properly. If you route it like I described above, you won’t need to solo anything, because only one track will be feeding that bus, and only one audio track will be “listening to” that bus.

As always, thank you all for your questions. If you have a question, you can submit it via the Ask Joe form. Also, if you have additional suggestions, please leave a comment. We’d love to hear from you.

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Ask Joe #7 – Connecting an Apogee Rosetta 200 to Studio Monitors

Joe Gilder — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 14:00:19 +0000

This week I’ve just got one question. If you have any questions for me, please ask via the Ask Joe form.

Mike wrote:
Was thinking of getting an Apogee Rosetta 200 converter. Do my monitor speakers get connected to the outs on the converter?

Photo by Y0si

Thanks Mike. This is a great question. First of all, kudos on picking the Rosetta 200. I’m a big fan of Apogee, and I think you’ll love the sound of the Rosetta.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with it, the Apogee Rosetta 200 is a two-channel converter from Apogee. It has two channels of analog-to-digital converters and two channels of digital-to-analog converters.

The Rosetta is a standalone converter, meaning that it doesn’t have any sort of direct connection to your computer (although they do offer an additional firewire option). In most cases, the Rosetta connects to your audio interface via either a S/PDIF, ADAT, or AES connections.

For example, if I was going to buy a Rosetta 200 for my Pro Tools system, I would connect it to the S/PDIF inputs and outputs on the back of my 003.

Why buy an external converter?

Before I answer Mike’s question, it’s important to address why one would even consider getting an external converter. After all, isn’t that what your audio interface is for?

Well, it’s true, an audio interface does handle A/D and D/A conversion, but high-end converters like the Rosetta 200 take your audio signal to the next level. They have tighter bass, more detail, and the stereo image of your recordings becomes much wider once you run it through a high-end converter.

Does everyone need a Rosetta 200? No. In fact, I would bet that the majority of people who buy a Rosetta 200 would be better suited by investing in better mics, preamps, monitors, or acoustic treatment first.

My general rule of thumb is that all of your equipment should makes sense together. You shouldn’t use a $3,000 microphone with a $90 mixer or an $1800 converter with $200 studio monitors, and you should always connect your equipment with good cables. Okay, sermon’s over. Assuming Mike already has a lot of nice equipment, let’s move on.

Connecting the Rosetta 200 to Studio Monitors

If you take a look at the back panel of the Rosetta 200, you’ll see that it has XLR analog outputs. These can certainly connect directly to your studio monitors, but…how do you control the volume? A glance at the front panel will show you that there’s no volume knob. What to do?

This is pretty standard with most standalone converters. They simply provide line inputs and outputs, no volume control. Typically in this situation you’ll want to consider also buying some sort of monitor management box. These will accept various inputs from converters, CD players, iPods, etc., and play them back through one or more pair of speakers. Most importantly, they allow for volume control.

A few options:

Mackie Big Knob – I owned this for a while – very cool box. It has a ton of input and output connections and lots of bells and whistles.
PreSonus Central Station – This is a bit more professional box, with a completely passive signal path. This allows the signal to pass through the box without being altered by op-amps, etc.

There are quite a few more options, from the fancy Dangerous Music Monitor ST to the ridiculously simple and inexpensive TC Electronic Level Pilot. Any of these would work well on the back end of the Rosetta.

What about adjusting the master fader?

In the early Pro Tools days, there really weren’t a lot of options for monitor management. Engineers had historically controlled monitor volume through the monitor section of a big ‘ol recording console.

With the advent of digital recording and Pro Tools, engineers realized that they could simply plug their converters directly into their studio monitors, bypassing the console entirely. However, they lost volume control, so they reverted to using the Master Fader in Pro Tools to control the volume.

This isn’t all that bad, except when you’re mixing, and you have a compressor or two instantiated on the master fader. Suddenly, if you turn down the master fader to listen at a lower volume, you completely change the level of signal hitting the compressor(s). This, in turn, changes the amount of compression, thus changing the sound of the entire mix.

This is why you need some sort of monitor management system.

I should note that my 003 has an “Aux Input” section that allows me to run a signal through the volume knob on the 003 itself. So, if you have a 003, you already have a little bit of monitor management built in.

Thanks for the question, Mike! I hope this helps. Anybody else have some advice? Please leave a comment.

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Ask Joe #5 – Setting Up a Home Studio

Joe Gilder — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 14:00:25 +0000

This episode of Ask Joe is a bit on the long side, but Chris asked some really good questions, and I think a lot of readers have the same sort of questions, so here we go!

Chris wrote:
Joe,

First, great website. I’ve been dabbling in home recording for a few years now, and this is by far the most user-friendly and intuitive user-generated website I’ve seen. It’s a great service, and I really appreciate it.

As I indicated, I’ve been “dabbling” in home recording for a few years. I initially got into it to make hip hop beats (a phase I went through) and to record basic guitar/vocal demos. Here’s my current rig:

- Dell Laptop
- FL Studio (with most FL Studio VSTs)
- E-Mu 1616M
- E-Mu X-Board 49
- Roland Computer Monitors
- MXL 990/993 condenser mic pair
- SM58 (not used much in recording)

After I satisfied my hip hop desires (two of my remixes are at www.soundclick.com/deejayesquire), I turned to recording more instrument-based music, recording mostly rock-, blues-, and bluegrass-informed music, using guitars (acoustic & electric), bass, mandolin, banjo, harmonica, various floor pedal effects, percussion (not a full drum set), and vocals.

After putzing around for a while, I’ve decided to devote more of my time to putting out a decent record. I know my current rig is lacking though.

To get things started, I just bought a new Dell desktop. Given the insane amount of power that’s available, the massive monitor, and the price, I thought the PC-route made the most sense. I’m also used to PCs and didn’t want to burden myself with learning a new operating system. In any event, that’s a relatively fixed starting point for me. Memory and storage are not an issue.

Unfortunately, new Dells have abandoned PCI slots, and now feature PCIe slots. This means I may not be able to use my E-Mu 1616M anymore, which I understood going into it. Maybe E-Mu sells a PCIe-compatible sound card, but it doesn’t look good. In any event, I was ok with that, because I was thinking about something that has more inputs. I have ambition to record a band and/or a drum set in the future.

My question for you (if you’re still with me) is what I should really be looking at? I’ve spent some time looking into new gear–good gear that will last.

Specifically:
- Software – how do you feel about FL Studio. I know it’s generally not considered top tier recording software, and originated with hip hop, etc., but I’ve grown used to it, have the Producer’s edition (with lifetime updates), and now how to use it. If I move on from it, I would probably aim for Pro Tools, but that would be a more expensive route, and limit some of options for audio interfaces, which I’ll get to next. In short, should I graduate from FL Studio, and it is a bad idea to build a home studio around it. Give it to me real.

- Audio Interfaces. I’m looking for more inputs, and leaning towards firewire (which I sense as more reliable and faster than USB 2.0). What do you think about the Presonus FP10?

- Mixer. Do I even need a hardware mixer? This seems to be a standard element in most home studios, but I’m not sure why, if the DAW software has a mixer. Maybe people just prefer real knobs to turn? What am I missing here?

- Microphones. I imagine I need to upgrade big time. This is unanimously something that people encourage. I was thinking about the Rode NT1-A mic. Should I go better? In part, I’m reluctant to drop $1K on a mic, if I’m just going to compress, EQ, and add effects to my vocals. But maybe I’m being naive here. I also intend to pick up an SM57.

- Monitors. I was thinking about the Behringer TRUTH B2031A Active Monitors. Thoughts or recommendations?

Basically, I’ve got about $2,000-$2,500 left to spend. To recap, my rig would look like this:

- Dell Desktop
- FL Studio (Producer’s edition)
- Presonus FP10
- E-Mu X-Board 49
- Rode NT1-A
- SM57
- Behringer TRUTH B2031A Active Monitors

I also intend to get some foam, direct box, and other accessories that I’ve gathered from your website (the 12 steps).

If you could give me your general sense of my conclusions here, that’d be great. What am I missing and where could I do better?

Thanks again,
Chris

Hey Chris!

Thanks for the great questions! I like the direction you’re going, and I know there are a ton of people asking similar questions.

Before I dive into gear recommendations, let me preface this with a few suggestions.

Gear is awesome, but don’t put off this album for three years while you accumulate the perfect studio. Anything you buy will have sufficient sound quality to make a great record. (See Gear Acquisition Syndrome.)

Also, be sure to refer back to my 12 Home Studio Necessities series. It goes a bit more in-depth into each of the things you’re asking about.

Computer

PCs can work just fine for recording. You may run into compatibility issues with motherboards, firewire chipsets, etc. But as long as you’re willing to change things out as needed, the Dell may work just fine.

Software

I’m not as familiar with FL Studio as I am with Pro Tools and Logic. However, I am a big proponent of using software you’re familiar with. (See Why I Use Pro Tools.) If you know FL Studio like the back of your hand, then it might be best to stick with it.

That being said, how well does FL Studio handle audio? Can you see yourself recording and mixing a full band with it? For hip-hop/remix stuff it’s great (I liked your remixes, by the way!), but you need to make sure you have the tools to do a complete project from start to finish.

If you see yourself outgrowing FL Studio soon, then it may be worth looking into something a little more full-featured.

For the PC, I’m a fan of Pro Tools. They’re incorporating a lot more in the way of virtual instruments (drum machines and samplers), which make it a pretty good choice.

Audio Interface

Firewire is probably the best way to go. There are a few good USB interfaces on the market, but I prefer firewire.

I owned the PreSonus FP10 with my Logic rig (back when it was called “Firepod”), and it worked like a charm. For some reason, PCs and firewire interfaces have a history of not getting along at times. My best advice for you would be to check the manufacturers’ websites and make sure there aren’t any known issues with the interface you want and the PC motherboard you have.

In fact, you should check out M-Audio interfaces. Their stuff has a history of being rock-solid on PCs.

Mixer

You’re absolutely right. Most home studio owners really have no need for a mixer. Sure, there are certain scenarios where it makes sense, but for most folks an interface and software will work just fine.

Microphones

It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of the Rode NT1A. Rode mics in general are a great value. I’d encourage you to at least have two good microphones if you can. Being able to do stereo recording is a plus.

I’d recommend a pair of Rode NT5 mics. Also, an SM57 is a staple. Good call.

Monitors

Monitors are important. Acoustic treatment, however, is just as important (perhaps even more important). I’ve not used or heard the Behringer monitors, but I have other brands I prefer to Behringer.

JBL, Yamaha, and M-Audio come to mind. They have some great monitors in the $300-800 price range that will suit you well. If you’re going to be doing a lot of hip-hop, it would be a good idea to get something with an 8-inch speaker to handle the low end.

Thanks for the great questions, Chris! Does anyone else have advice or suggestions? Leave a comment.

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12 Home Studio Necessities #5 – Studio Monitors

Joe Gilder — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 15:57:30 +0000

If you were to browse any of the popular recording forums, it wouldn’t take you long to find someone complaining about how their mixes don’t translate.

What he’s complaining about is that he records a song, spends hours in his studio mixing it, and then it sounds completely different when he burns a copy to go listen to in his car or stereo.

This is something that has always plagued engineers and will continue to do so for years to come.

The issue? Everybody listens to music on a different set of speakers. And no two sets of speakers sound the same. So a perfectly crafted mix on one pair of speakers could sound really bass-heavy and muddy on another pair.

The Cure

While there is no quick fix for this, the biggest reason mixes don’t translate is inaccurate studio monitors. (When I say studio monitors, I’m referring to speakers specifically designed for “reference monitoring” in a recording environment.)

When you’re mixing a song, you want to hear exactly what’s going on in the music. If you’ve got a cheap set of speakers that do something to the sound to make it sound “better,” you’ll end up with a mix that sounds good…but only on that specific pair of speakers…not anywhere else.

Imagine you’re a really bad vocalist. (Don’t freak out, this is strictly hypothetical.) Now imagine that you have a magical set of speakers that make you sound amazing. Everything you sing through them is just heavenly.

Here’s the catch. These speakers are too big and heavy to take to a gig or studio, so you only sound good at home.

Now you go to sing in a studio or at a gig (or at an American Idol audition), and your real voice comes out. Suddenly you’re all over the news as the world’s worst vocalist. If only your speakers (and your friends) had told you the truth.

Flat is Good

So we’re in a agreement. You don’t want your studio monitors to lie to you. What you want is a pair of monitors that have a flat frequency response, meaning they don’t boost or cut certain frequencies. Flat studio monitors give you a clean slate on which you can begin your mixes.

So…which monitors are flat? A lot of the same principles I discussed with microphones applies to studio monitors. You get what you pay for. Cheaper monitors tend to be less flat than more expensive ones.

Microphones and studio monitors are arguably the most important part of your studio. Microphones capture the sound. Studio monitors reproduce it. Yes, you need a good audio interface, but it’s all for naught if your microphones and monitors are garbage.

That being said, you should plan to invest a decent amount of money into your monitors – at least a couple hundred dollars.

There are as many monitor options as there are microphone options, but the main point I want to make is this – Don’t use cheap computer speakers to mix your music.

Rather than dropping $70 on a pair of Logitech computer speakers at Best Buy, go to a place like Sweetwater.com and check out the studio monitors. Any studio monitor would be better than cheap computer speakers. Trust me…I used them on my first album in high school, and as I’ve said before, ’twasn’t good.

How big?

You’ll notice that there are studio monitors of all different shapes and sizes. Generally speaking, the bigger the speaker, the better it is at reproducing low frequencies. A 3-inch monitor isn’t going to have nearly the same bass response as an 8-inch monitor.

The biggest problem area I have when my mixes don’t translate well is how the lows sound. I mixed for a few years on some nice little 5-inch monitors. They sounded great and were fairly accurate. However, due to the fact that they were only 5-inch monitors, I couldn’t hear what was happening in the deep bass of my songs.

I would record something as simple as a guitar-vocal, and it would sound great in my studio. Then I’d play it on a system with bigger speakers and BOOM! There’s a TON of bass on the guitar that I simply couldn’t hear on my smaller monitors at home.

The bass was always there, from the moment I recorded it. I just never knew it because my speakers couldn’t reproduce it.

My Recommendation

If you can afford it, try to get something with a 6-inch to 8-inch woofer on it. I’ve found that these tend to reproduce enough low frequency information to provide reliable, accurate mixes.

Spend at least $300-$500 if you can. $700-$1500 will get you into a really professional set of monitors, but avoid spending less than $200 if you can. You’ll only end up using them for a year at most. Then you’ll sell them for some nicer monitors.

What about headphones?

I’ll discuss headphones in the next article, but generally-speaking they’re not great for mixing. Because they’re so close to your ears, they tend to make the bass sound louder than it actually is. Also, the stereo imaging (how the song sounds from left to right) is very different than with studio monitors. More on that to come.

What I Use

In my home studio, I use M-Audio EX66 monitors. They’re a bit different from your standard monitor in that they have two 6-inch woofers instead of a single woofer. This gives it a very deep, tight response.

Ever since I got these, I noticed that my mixes started sounding much better. I still have to work hard to manipulate the audio to my liking, but a good set of monitors always makes it easier to hear what’s going on in the mix.

M-Audio EX66

What monitors do you use? What questions do you have? Leave a comment!

* This article is part 6 of a 13-article series - 12 Home Studio Necessities

All Articles in the 12 Home Studio Necessities Series: