Matching volumes on monitors

Nick The Man

Nick The Man

New member
I have had this problem probably ever since I got my first pair of wharfedales. Now I have Event ASP8s and Ive been doing a heavy amount of mixing latley and it is obvious that one monitor is louder that the other. Heres the screwball, they are both set at the same level on all of my equipment, and even when I play a sine wave at the same level on both the monitors it is still clear that the left is louder. I can imagine that my room would effect this when I am sitting directly in front of the monitors, and it is also noticable if you put your ear up to them and compare.

I guess my question is, is this a common problem that I should just match them up by ear and be happy, or could there potentially be something wrong with the monitors?

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Ok now I have matched them up by ear to the best ability and the input sensitivitys on the monitors are a substancial difference from eachother, the left is turned up a quarter of the way and the right is turned up halfway.
 
What's feeding them? Not all analog boxes are exactly perfect. I chased similar problems untill I got my Mackie mixer out of there.

I can imagine that my room would effect this when I am sitting directly in front of the monitors, and it is also noticable if you put your ear up to them and compare.
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You sould swap L/R just to make sure the cause is up-stream electrical.
 
Get a cheap AC voltmeter from radioshack and measure the levels at various places . Use a mono signal that shows equal levels coming out of the mixer. If getting equal levels from the mixer when the mixer meters show them to be equal requires adjustment then you have found your problem. Proceed down the signal chain ( amp input L/R) ( Amp output L/R)
(speaker input L/R) If these all show equal values when comparing L to R the next step will be to swap the mon's Your problem could be caused by a crappy cable or spkr line. Just be methodical about it and you will find the problem.


chazba
 
I use a db meter and calibrate each monitor to read the same number of db's at the listening position, one at a time. I do this with pink noise, and don't remember off the top of my head what the db level is but its the bob katz recommendation.
 
I think I may have simply solved the problem... something I should have tried before creating a thread, but this topic brought up some good discussion.

My chain is simple, interface>monitors... thats it, however I had inserted a patchbay inbetween the chain. So I had interface>patchbay>monitors, anyways so I simply took the patchbay out of the chain and now the monitors function properly. So it was either poor patch cables (you get what you pay for) or my patchbay has some junk connections. I actually have all of my analog inputs run through the patchbay as well so I think I will just completley remove the patchbay from my chain, and from my rack. Anyone need a patchbay? ;)

Thanks for all the input, I'll have to pick up that radioshack meter.
 
Nick The Man said:
I'll have to pick up that radioshack meter.
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Absolutely positively every engineer should have one. From the earliest rookie to the most seasoned professional. FAR too handy of a tool to not have at the ready.

You won't use it a lot - But when you need it, there's really no substitute.
 
sounds like another good reason to keep the monitor chain as simple as possible.

isn't the 80-85db the "target" for setup because all frequencys have the same volume there, theoretically flat? someone mentioned that it seems.
 
Massive Master said:
Turn up the left speaker (or have someone else do it) until the meter reads 79dBSPL on the meter. Then disconnect that speaker and do the same with the right. Reconnect and presto - 85dBSPL at the mix position with a -20dB(FS)RMS signal.
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Check out his article on calibrating the monitor chain
 
COOLCAT said:
sounds like another good reason to keep the monitor chain as simple as possible.

isn't the 80-85db the "target" for setup because all frequencys have the same volume there, theoretically flat? someone mentioned that it seems.
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Our perceptions of the frequencies are flat (Fletcher-Munson)in that range. Excluding the room, frequencies are frequencies no matter how loud or soft they are.

To balance the levels between two speakers you can use any consistent level. If they measure the same muting one then the other, they are balanced.

Setting up -20 dBFS and 85 db levels have more to do with maintaining a reference listening level. See Bob Katz' K-20 recomendations for more info:

http://www.digido.com/bob-katz/level-practices-part-2-includes-the-k-system.html
 
thats a lot of reading! i jumped around some and its got a lot of info and explains the 83db well. great article though.
 
I just went and bought the meter and loaded up my -20dbFS pink noise and then turned each monitor up to 79db (on C weighting and slow response) and then turned them both on, it seemed scary loud, I cant imagine playing anything else at that volume, exspecially a song that has already been mastered, I must be missing something here
 
Yeah but wa it scary loud balanced? ;):D

Try pulling it down to a comfortable level in your recording app. The software should be reliable and uniform.
 
Nick The Man said:
I just went and bought the meter and loaded up my -20dbFS pink noise and then turned each monitor up to 79db (on C weighting and slow response) and then turned them both on, it seemed scary loud, I cant imagine playing anything else at that volume, exspecially a song that has already been mastered, I must be missing something here
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Remember, there's a significant difference in RMS between pink noise and musical content (for most music genres, anyway); pink noise is typically going to have some 8 - 15dB higher RMS than your average mastered mix (even a good 6dB over even a headbanger's volume war pancake.) So pink noise IS going to sound louder.

But even with that in mind, yeah, for many of us 85dB *is* pretty loud, even for music. It's not something you necessarily want to mix at constantly for the entire session - many big name pro engineers do much of their mixing well below that level, but do bring it up loud for periods when one needs to verify that the frequency balance and mix level balance hold together at those volumes.

And not to pick nits here, just to make sure that there is proper understanding; the human ear is not anywhere near flat in response at 85dBSPL, it's just that *on average for most ears* (no guarantee your or my ears will agree) this is the volume range where they tend to be the least bumpy.

There's nothing specifically magical about exactly 85dBSPL. The average ISO curve at 85dB is not all that different from the 70dB curve or even the 90dB curve. (Pull up the interactive frequency chart on my website and click on it's "Ear Sensitivity" icon for a detailed ear sensitivity chart, and look at the curves for 70, 80 and 90dB; other than the obvious difference in overall volume level the actual curves are quite similar.)

Your monitors and room acoustics are probably going to smear out or mask any tiny differences in those curves anyway. Add to that, there's no guarantee that your specific ears will be best at exactly 85dBSPL. All those ISO and Fletcher Munson curves and all that are averages for the species based upon specific test listening conditions.

Put simply, 85dB is a good guidepost as a general of thumb, and an easy way to state and remember an important point about how loudness affects hearing, but 85dB is by no means a strict or a magical number in and of itself.

G.
 
Nick The Man said:
I just went and bought the meter and loaded up my -20dbFS pink noise and then turned each monitor up to 79db (on C weighting and slow response) and then turned them both on, it seemed scary loud, I cant imagine playing anything else at that volume, exspecially a song that has already been mastered, I must be missing something here
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As mentioned above setting up with a -20 ref point at 86 is a reference level for listening to material that has an average level of -20. You wouldn't want to listen to most currently mastered CDs at this level where a reference of level of -12 or -10 might be more appropriate. Really other than for measurements and setting up something like a theater system or the K-system I see little use for this. When you are mixing and mastering you should listen at a variety of levels to hear how everything holds together, so the "reference" is variable.

[edit] G. beat me to the post this time ;)
 
... i think im going to return my meter, i cant seem to think of any application that I will need it for. $50 could be spent on something a whole lot cooler. :cool:
 
Bump a knob on the back of one of your speakers or try to find an anomaly in the system and you're going to regret it. That thing will rarely be used, but should be within reach always.

A SPL meter is a necessity. It has a "cool" factor of around 3.7 -- But most things that are vital to a system (such as broadband traps) are anything but "cool."
 
Nick The Man said:
... i think im going to return my meter, i cant seem to think of any application that I will need it for. $50 could be spent on something a whole lot cooler. :cool:
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If you're going to pursue audio engineering an SPL meter is a very-good-to-have piece of gear, much like a multi-meter.

Sometimes I use mine to show clients the relative "loudness" of a master track by track as this is a better indicator than a peak or RMS meter.

If nothing else it's good to pull out if you're arguing with your girlfriend and want to show her how loud she is. For $50 I don't know that you can get anything too much cooler.
 
masteringhouse said:
If nothing else it's good to pull out if you're arguing with your girlfriend and want to show her how loud she is. For $50 I don't know that you can get anything too much cooler.
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Maybe not cooler, but $50 can also buy the nice bunch of roses that I'd probably need to make up with my girlfriend after I showed her how her yelling broke my meter. :D

As I found out last fall, having one of those meters can make you look like a hero when your friend calls looking for one that his kid can borrow for his school science project (he set up a neat little experiment measuring the sound deadening qualities of different materials.)

That's probably the first time I've used that meter in at least 6 years - I was surprised that the battery was still good - , but it sure feels good knowing that I have it in my toolbox. Kind of like knowing that you still have a beer and some leftover pizza in the fridge for later, even though you're not hungry now ;).

G.
 
Hmmm, I just broke out my SPL meter and checked a song playing C weighted slow response, and 85 db was a pretty moderate listening level. How loud should a song be playing back at?
 
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