Never thought I would do this!!!

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sonusman

sonusman

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I have been a big fan of my Event 20/20 passive monitors for over 4 years now. I still really love them and won't get rid of them.

BUT!!! A new kid has moved into my monitor 'hood' here!

http://www.sundholm-acoustics.com/SL80.htm

I have been using these Sundholms for a bunch of work recently and found that I could trust them after only needing to hear just a bit of music through them.

Just two days ago I mastered a Rap CD using these monitors with NO subwoofer. While the bass wasn't like what you would hear in a car or club sound system with a sub woofer, I still found that I could place the low end quite well. The client, the studio owner, and I were very happy with the low end on this recent job, and I used the Sundholmes exclusively to master.

I still think that if you are on a budget that the Event 20/20's are an excellent monitor to purchase. I would say they are about as good as you can possibly get in the "budget" price range.

But if you are looking in the $1000US price range for near field monitors, the Sundholm SL 8.0 would get my full endorsement! Compared to all Genelec's, these monitors have an much more accurate midrange and are very true in the high end.

I found that I could monitor with them for several hours without ear fatique (I took about 7 hours to do the eq and compression on 21 songs for that Rap CD I just mastered). I was actually quite surprised that what I heard after 12 hours on working on this CD that the sound was the same to my ears as it was in the first hour! If you have ever done marathon mixing/mastering like this, you will know that after around 5 or 6 hours that your ears start getting very sensitive to upper mids. I just didn't find this to be the case with the Sundholms.

So there it is, my full endorsement of these excellent near field monitors.

By the way, Sundholm Acoustics is one of the ex-owners of Sunn Amplifiers. There is a long history behind this company of excellent products.

Ed
 
Betcha they still don't touch the Meyer HD-1s!!!

:D

Bruce
 
I am betting you are wrong! :) Bruce, you would be blown away with these monitors. I just cannot believe how pure the sound is on them!!! The more I use them the more I fall in love with them. The accuracy is just amazing.

These monitors have a very present low midrange to them and forces you to deal with defining that 100-300Hz region in a mix that will make the difference in achieving good definition and a powerfull sound.

I just got an email back from the owner and he wants me to try out (demo) some of their microphone cable too. Of course I will put it up against the Monster SP 1000 and 500 I have. And I STILL have some Mogami and Canare cable that I need to check out and send back to RE!!! ;) I will post the results when I get to it.

Ed
 
OK... NOW you're making me want to check them out -- I'll keep my eyes open!

Bruce
 
$1000!@@#

Since I'm now mixing with headphones the Event monitors would be a step up.

What's the street price for a set of Event monitors?

Also what kind of amp are you using to drive those?
 
Yes, that's per monitor... and those are the PASSIVE (ie, unamplified) version... so you still need an amp for 'em.........

Bruce
 
Blue Bear Sound said:
Yes, that's per monitor... and those are the PASSIVE (ie, unamplified) version... so you still need an amp for 'em.........

Bruce

Passive monitors is what was stipulated at the top of the thread.

Still $300 for a pair of quality near fields ain't too shabby;)

Besides, who can tell what MF is telling you on that page, they word it in such a way that you can't tell if it's a pair or a single for that price:mad:
 
True... but if you place 2 in your shopping cart and advance to the total screen, it becomes very clear!

And the price is good - they are good monitors!

:)

Bruce
 
Blue Bear Sound said:
True... but if you place 2 in your shopping cart and advance to the total screen, it becomes very clear!
Bruce

:eek: :eek: :eek: Unless I intend to buy, I'm too askeered to do that:eek: :eek: :eek:

Anyway, I like 'em too.

:D
 
Maybe you guys can help me.

I'm the town idiot.

I was wondering if you guys could help me.

Let's say I bought these speakers. Which I probably will.
I have a Mackie 1202VLZpro mixer.

It has two control room out 1/4" plugs.

I would need to purchase a amplifier for the speakers, two 1/4" cables, and the speakers.

My question is, by the way I'm drunk, what amp do I get with these speakers? Do I match the wattage of the amp with the speakers? should it be more? yada yada yada.

If I was sober this would all make perfect sense.

I'm not a drunk. I drink for medicinal purposes. My wife has bought it so far........
 
Good question re: power amp. I just ordered event 20/20s (and they showed up broken! speaker falling out...sorry needed to vent) Actually event call tagged them and expressed me a new pair....so I'm happy.

Anyway I'm going to buy a power amp this week and I'm looking for advice. I've been look at the hafler 1100 and the alesis ra 100 or ra 150, and also the samson servo 120. I think I'm going with the hafler but does anyone have any ideas? The hafler actually has less power but it "seems" like a better amp. Would the power (50 watts per channel) over 75 or 100 watts per channel make a big difference?
 
I was never impressed with Alesis amps - but I also haven't tried the new ones, so I don't know if they were any better... the earlier ones are underpowered and it shows...

The Samson I have is serviceable, but again, somewhat underpowered.... Hafler is certainly a studio "standard", as is QSC and Crown...

But, brand names aside, you really want to get a fairly powerful, clean amp to power nearfields. I personally would not go less than 100 watts...

There is no such thing as matching your monitors to your amp in terms of power... it is much better to use a 200-300 watt amp on speakers that are only rated for 25 watts (that's a real life example - NS-10s powered with a decent amp!) than to have a 25 watt amp driving the 25 watt speakers.

The reason is that the distortion of sending the amp into clipping is usually what causes blown monitors, as opposed to overdriving them with too much power. Clipping transients kill tweeters faster than high power does!

So I would go with a high-quality, higher-power (100 watts or more) amp.... possibly one of the better Haflers.......

On the other hand, you could just buy yourself the Event 20/20 actives, which have the power amp built-in to each monitor. It will be less expensive to go that route than buying the monitors/amp separately!

Bruce
 
I use NAD Power amps... I have the big 200 watt per side model..(was about $1600 new)... and I love it... You can get smaller versions in the NAD line for $499... and they are still decent quality for the money.....

Joe
 
RA100 +event 20/20

I have the events + a RA100. It sounds good and I don't get any clipping. They don't get _cranking_ loud. They still get loud enough and you will probably want to mix at a moderate level anyways.


My personal adage was to get inexpensive yet good enough monitors and amp for now and concentrate on good mic pres and good balanced cabling, and a good compressor.
After I have the input side of the studio optimized then I'll work on the output, mixing, effects, blah blah.
 
RA 100

I own the RA100 with Monitor Ones and am not impressed. While the Monitor Ones are definitely lacking, I have also not heard great things about the RA100 (after purchase, of course).

The combination gives me ear fatigue rather quickly and does not translate well to other systems, even after attempting to compensate for its nuances.

I am currently considering replacing the Monitor Ones with the 20/20s. It may not be the best combination with the RA100, but it is less expensive than upgrading everything at once. I'll probably concentrate on the amp later...


Matt
 
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