Man, what an interesting read! So many considerations I haven't even considered!
I still consider myself a "newb" and on the great advice I've gotten here from the
top Freq-wranglers, in the past month, I've remixed my seven songs (so far) and
been absolutely amazed at the quality, clarity, separation and pro quality "presence"
I've been able to obtain.
I mix ROUGH largely with earphones, and I've tuned my studio speakers to give me
the same TONAL QUALITIES (Bass, mid-ranges & highs) my Sennheiser HD 280 Pro
phones give me. But as already stated, there are mix considerations on the speakers
that only rear their ugly heads when you put AIR between your ears.
On great advice from a seasoned pro with massive success, I decide to believe him;
"There are so many things you can never control when the track leaves your domain.
I've found that mixing as though I were producing a CD (quality) song or 'album' to be
played back on the best quality stereo system available works best. Why?
Because you can always 'dumb down' a mix, that's easy. But you can't ADD what isn't
there in the first place."
I've been testing my mixes on my home theater system (bluRay) and my trucks system,
my wifes car, my shed stereo with my phone (a basic computer sound system with a
powered sub-woofer) and no matter how good I get the mix, there are always HARDWARE
differences and another thing I didn't see mentioned here at all (unless I missed it!);
PRESETS. Almost every music playback device now has at least ten presets that represent
someone else's idea of what country, rock, R&B, hip hop, etc., music should be EQ'ed
at. n my truck, my presets SUCK. "Flat-lining it' makes it sound flat. Period. and...
my Galaxy phone has it's own EQ, and I didn't even know it, because I'd never even
looked for it. Now plug that phone (and it's EQ preset) into my trucks bluetooth, and
IT'S presets and I've got presets fighting presets!
So I've decided to do what I've been told by a man who made a cool mil doing mix
and mastering jobs over twenty years, and still going;
"Make it the best you can when it leaves your studio. It's the best chance for an
overall good sound when the massive amounts of unknown variables are in play."