Headphone Mix/Central Station Questions

[toilinthedark]

This is my first post. I have quite a bit of analog-type studio recording experience. About a year ago I put together a DAW based home studio (see pertinent specs below). I have just been recording my guitar direct using a POD Pro and monitoring thru my speakers.
I now have a need to record a vocalist and pianist (not playing together).
I want to avoid having to buy a mixer to handle headphone mixes and front end signal routing. I was looking at the Central Station. I see that some posters on this board really like this unit. I appreciate the fact that it is transparent sonically.
My questions are:
How do I send a 'talent' headphone mix from Logic to the Central Station?
Will there be latency issues if I do software monitoring exclusively for the headphone mix? Or should I hardware monitor the incoming vox or piano?
Do I send the headphone mix to the Cue input of the CS?
Where in the signal chain should I add effects for the vocalist? This would not be to print to disk, just for the vocalist. I have an outboard effects processor.

Thanks
Mike

Mac G4 Single 500
Emagic Logic Pro
Delta 1010
dbx 576 Channel Strip

[DJL]

Here's some cool pages about the PreSonus Central Station...

http://216.239.57.104/search?q=cache...adphones&hl=en

http://www.kellyindustries.com/signa...l_station.html

http://www.presonus.com/centralstation.html

[tollbooth]

hey mike

can i just chip in with a recommendation for the Mackie Big Knob (oh i hate typing that!). i've been using mine for about 8 weeks now, and it's lovely. not as flexible and comprehensive as the Presonus, but a fraction of the cost. still vey transparent. good controls and very well thought out design. the only issue is, dependent on where you place it, you may end up with cables trailing along your desk. Presonus Remote is much better in that respect, but again, it's a cost issue.

really nice feature on the Mackie is the headphone routing for separate mixes, and the GEM of a feature - the DIM switch which knocks your monitor level down to about 25% of normal, which means you can still hear things and be heard during a conversation! actually much more useful feature than i make it sound.

check it out at the Mackie website - well worth a look. my UK price was under £300.

have fun and happy listening

paul d