NS-10's

[littledog]

the NS10s have been good enough for rock-n-roll for 4 decades.

Glad they work for you. After four decades, I'd say you qualify for the category of someone who "knows how to mix on them".

 

[Light]

Ill check shit sometimes on my tannoy model 600s but the NS10s get worked first...I dont do rap so a huge ammount of bass isnt nessasary to crank out of my monitors. the NS10s have been good enough for rock-n-roll for 4 decades.

Where do you get four decades? They came out in the early eighties.


Light

"Cowards can never be moral."
M.K. Gandhi

 

[Han]

To me, NS-10 show me trouble areas in my mixes.

Bingo! that's what NS10's are very good at.

They're very difficult to make a great sounding mix on, but when you can, it will sound killer on most home stereos.

I kind of like the NS10 very much, even a bass can sound great on them, the only problem is the lows below 80 hz.
But that's where mains are good at.

I say the NS10 is a great near field monitor.

 

[littledog]

Hey Han,

There are a couple of good threads from May 2002 that you may want to also revive!

 

[Han]

Littledog, do you have a link? There are so many threads about the NS10 all over the forums that it will take me a week to read them all.

NS10.......when I had bought them and listened for the first time, I thought, what a piece of crap this is.

But I got to know them and like them. It's a monitor you either love or hate, there's no 'in between'.

Yesterday I listened to a number of karaoke CD's (from the USA) and some of them sound really nice on the NS10's, even the bass!

A while back I was recording a jazz band, you know, with that fuzzy guitar sound and a (digital) piano.
There was something with the guitar and the piano which was a real problem, as if they were 'eating' eachother.

I solo'd the guitar and piano on the NS10's and the problem was solved by tweaking the eq with ease.

This is where the NS10's really shine, you can hear problems in the low mids very good, when there's 'mud', you will hear it on NS10's.

I know this is all subjective, but stating that the NS10 is a bad monitor, which many forumites still do, is simply untrue.

If you can't make a mix sound decent on NS10's, you can't mix!

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

If you can't make a mix sound decent on NS10's, you can't mix!

I disagree... people repeat this myth over and over and it's nonsense.... "...if you can make a mix sound good on NS-10s, it'll sound good everywhere..."

Ugh.... sorry... no...

A good mix is one that by definition translates well across systems. The mix comes before the monitors. The monitors are simply tools that let your ears hear it. And you have to have the right tool for your ears, so that you can make the tonal and balance adjustments that will make the mix.

So in my case, where I'm quite confident of my mixing ability, I could NEVER get a mix to my taste on NS10s. They simply don't tell MY ears what I need to hear to properly balance a mix.

So let's cut the rhetoric.

If NS10s work for you great, but they are simply one tool option out of many... they have no mythical, magical properties that make mixes on them any better or worse than any other monitor...

 

[Han]

Bruce, whatever floats your boat, they say.

I happen to have a gearpimp who brings all kind of stuff here every now and then, so I have had many nearfields here, the KRK's and the Genelecs too.

I don't know the B&W's you're using, are they good or very good?

Cheers, Han

 

[Blue Bear Sound]

The B&Ws are quite good - excellent imaging and detail.

I'm switching from the KRKs over to ADAM S2-As very shortly, though........

I made the mistake of hearing the ADAMs at a colleague's studio recently.... ever since then the KRKs didn't cut it for me, anymore - although I consider the KRKs excellent monitors!

 

[littledog]

If you can't make a mix sound decent on NS10's, you can't mix!

HEY!!! I thought you promised not to tell everybody I can't mix, and now you go shooting off your mouth! Some guys just can't keep a secret!!!

 

[JMarcomb]

uk producer paul hardcastle used the ns10's for his high/high mid freq monitoring until they blew up on him he monitors loud
then he switched to tannoy low/ jbl high combo