Need help, noob, can I record in stereo...

[bennychico11]

I think people may be going over your head.

lol...pretty much echoing what Glen, Mad, Nick and myself were saying


but it's all good. he's said he's pretty sure he's recording a mono track though. Which brought me to the I/O setup possibility

(and possibly the mix knob. I've never owned an Mbox, but I wouldn't doubt if the mix knob in it's no latency position keeps channels 1/2 in their respective L/R channels when recording...an Mbox owner will have to correct me on this if I'm wrong. The manual doesn't say and I can't find any schematics of the unit.)

NP, Ben. I was just trying to refer you as the go to guy for Pro Tools on this board.

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to SouthSIDE Glen again.

It's said that for the past couple years now it seems

 

[ez_willis]

Are you using an extension cable?

Do the headphones work properly with anything else? Are you getting sound out of both sides?

Have you plugged the phones into anything else to determine that it's not the phones themselves?

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

Are you using an extension cable?

Do the headphones work properly with anything else? Are you getting sound out of both sides?

Have you plugged the phones into anything else to determine that it's not the phones themselves?

Yeah, *if* he is indeed recording to a mono track, there's no way I can think of why his signal would not pan right.

I'm wondering what he has his headphones plugged into. If he has them plugged into a mono output on the Mbox or something like that, that would cause the symptoms as well. That's just another version of the ol' plugging mono signal (the mono out) into a stereo recipticle (the stereo headphones) and getting the mono signal on the left only.

G.

 

[drummerboy_04AP]

I have them plugged right into the headphones jack on the front of the Mbox.

I played around with the mix knob, and alls it does is determines how much mix you get in the headphones, not left or right.

I also set the I/O to default.


Faulty Mbox??

 

[SouthSIDE Glen]

Faulty Mbox??

What do your computer speakers coming out of your regular soundcard tell you? If they are playing both channels fine, then it *might* be either your Mbox or your headphones.

If they are also playing only left channel, then it's probably in your PT settings. That's still where my money is, if only because this is such a common new user problem. It seems to come up about once a month on this forum (regardless of software brand.)

G.

 

[drummerboy_04AP]

hmm, i dunno. Thanks for trying to help me out though, Ill have to keep messing with it.

 

[bennychico11]

what brand of headphones are you using?
have you tried a different kind?

can you give us a screen shot of your PT session? preferably your mix window (just to triple check everything)

I don't know if you said already, but do you have speakers plugged into your Mbox? if so, how is it coming out of them?

 

[hairylarry]

It takes a while

drummerboy,

It takes a while to learn this stuff. Don't let it get you down.

I remember when I first got SAW about ten years ago. Nothing made any sense. Now I whiz through it. And Adobe Premiere! Damn. Talk about a learning curve.

I don't have protools but I hear the interface is idiosyncratic. I hope to get to review Adobe Audition. I'm sure that will be like learning Premiere.

Thanks,

Hairy Larry

 

[Kevin Deschwazi]

I'm a Cubase user so it might be different for PT. However....

Are you using any plug-ins on the master bus?

In Cubase a mono plug-in on the stereo master will give you the exact problem you're describing.

 

[RAK]

there is a difference between recording in stereo and playing back in stereo.
you should ALWAYS be playing back in stereo...but not necessarily always recording in stereo.

stereo means two. two speakers or two microphones. when you press play the sound comes out in stereo...two speakers. But when you record a voice, you record with one microphone...making a mono track.

And to take it a step further, it's not enough to have just two microphones or two speakers, it's two microphones AND two speakers.
If you have a mono signal that you send out through L&R Speakers (or heaphones), it's just a dual mono. Similarly, if you use two microphones to record a source in a stereo array, and play them back through one speaker, that's not stereo either.

You need to have two microphones in a stereo array recording a source that captures two different audio feeds, and each is played back through two speakers. I specify in a stereo array, because obviously putting close micing your guitar cab with two different microphones but recording the same information is not what we're talking about when we say two microphones for a stereo recording.

Unless of course your 1 microphone is a stereo microphone with a Y cable, it's still two capsules.

 

[Soul Coming]

Is there a switch on your headphones that says MONO/STEREO? Maybe you have that switched over to STEREO instead of MONO?

 

[ez_willis]

Look at any and all cables and/or extensions going from the headphones to whatever the headphones plug into. Look at the picture below. All cables and extension cables should have a stereo(TRS) connector. If one doesn't, you'll only get mono(unless you partially unplug it. That's for another day), regardless of size.

 

[drummerboy_04AP]

Well, I finally got it to work. It must have been a bad 1/4" adapter, cuz i got new headphones, and i plugged em in with the adaptor that came with them and it worked right away!