Mixing down from 4-Track to home stereo

[Mantofini]

I don't know if this is common but every time I mix down from my 4-track to my stereo the right speaker is always barely audible whereas the left speaker can be heard perfectly.

I have a Yamaha MT50 4-track and Citizen mini-stereo system.

I simply connect the stereo output of my 4-track to the auxiliary input of the stereo. I then play the tape in my 4-track to get the mix that I want. After that I rewind the 4-track press play and record on my stereo's tape player.

Everything sounds fine when it's being played from the 4-track. When I listen to my mixdown however the I can barely hear anything in the right speaker. I have to put my ear about 2cm from the speaker to hear anything.

What's wrong? I've tried doing this on the other stereos in my house but I still end up with the same results.

 

[drstawl]

Could be one of two things. Are you monitoring the mix thru one circuit on the Yamaha and "mixing down" thru another? You probably have some unintended panning set up.
The other possibility is a faulty output jack or cable between the Yamaha and the Citizen. My Portastudio has a bad jack that lowers the volume somewhat in one channel. But your problem is a little more severe.

 

[SPINSTERWUN]

You will have to figure it out by using the process of elimination.

Have you tried to do your mixdowns using a different monitoring system?

Do you get the same results?

What about the device that is doing the recording?

Are your speakers connected properly?

Are the heads of the 4 track clean?

Are the heads demagnetized?

Are you recording to tape?

Are you recording to CD?

Are your patch cords in working order (meaning, no shorts in them).

Like drstawl mentioned, are any of your tracks panned?

What about the gain on the tracks?

Post us back with a little bit more information.

peace...

spin

 

[jdavis]

RCAS?

If you're using RCA cables from the 4-track to the stereo, try switching it on of the sides, see if it makes a difference. That way you can rule out a short in the cord...hopefully. Most of the time when I have one channel that's faulty, it's somewhere in a cable/connection...check those first...they're the cheapest to fix anyway


***Justin***

 

[Mantofini]

Could be one of two things. Are you monitoring the mix thru one circuit on the Yamaha and "mixing down" thru another? You probably have some unintended panning set up.
The other possibility is a faulty output jack or cable between the Yamaha and the Citizen. My Portastudio has a bad jack that lowers the volume somewhat in one channel. But your problem is a little more severe.

I was monitoring through the stereo when I was making the mix. So the same circuit was being used. I did have two tracks panned, one to the left and one to the right. I couldn't hear the one panned to the right at all but the track panned to the left was perfectly audible. I also had another two tracks the weren't panned at all and they could both only be heard through the left speaker as well on my final mix.

I don't see how the jack or cable could be the problem because I was using the same jack and cable to listen my song as I was mixing it. Therefore if there was a problem with the jack and cables I wouldn't have been able to hear the right speaker during the mixing process at all.

It's only when I listen to my final mix (the one that has been mixed down to stereo so that it can play in my tape player) that I can't hear right speaker.


Thanks a lot for replying though. I very much appreciate it.

 

[Mantofini]

in response to SPINSTERWUN and jdavis:

I have mixed down onto my sister's mini stereo system. I think it's a Panasonic... Anyway the same thing occurred. Everything sounded fine through the auxiliary port of the stereo system but, the tape that was made from that port had barely audible sounds coming out of the right speaker.

The 4-track itself seems to be fine. The speakers work fine because I hear the right speaker perfrectly when I'm listening to my song through the stereo. As for the heads, I have no idea if they're clean or demagnetized but everything sounds fine while monitoring whether on headphones or through the stereo.

If I wasn't clear before I was recording my final mix to a regular cassette tape. One of them good type II ones. I checked the cord for a short but didn't find one. Panning was responded too earlier.
The gain and levels were properly set. Like I've said before everything sounds fine except for the final tape.

I'm starting to think that the problem might be the tape deck that I'm actually taping too but, I'll have to find that out.

Again, thanks for replying.

 

[Senor Cactus]

Have you recorded anything on that stereo from a device other than your 4-track? Does it work?

It almost sounds like the problem is in your stereo's recording heads. If everything sounds fine while you're monitoring through the stereo but not on playback of the mixdown, the problem must be in the device doing the recording.

I would try recording something from another device to check.