should I mix in stereo or mono?

  • Thread starter Thread starter hawk
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hawk

hawk

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I recorded several guitar tracks then mixed it down. When I save my mix (using CE Pro,) in stereo it makes a larger file. But, when I play it back it doesn't sound any different than if I save it in mono, I.E. the sounds come out of both speakers at once. Is there any reason to save it in stereo?

thanks!
 
If there is nothing stereo going on on the mix it would sound the same. No panning or verb at all?
The interesting part is, if you do do a mono mix doesn't it still have to go to a 2-track L/R file anyway for CDA? Never tried to make a mono cd. Hmm.
 
hawk said:
I recorded several guitar tracks then mixed it down. When I save my mix (using CE Pro,) in stereo it makes a larger file. But, when I play it back it doesn't sound any different than if I save it in mono, I.E. the sounds come out of both speakers at once. Is there any reason to save it in stereo?
thanks!
Click to expand...

If you have ten seperately recorded tracks and you have them all panned down the center it will sound like a mono file when played back, and when you mix down to stereo it will still sound mono because all tracks were panned down the middle during mixing. You have to pan different tracks to different places in the stereo field to achieve stereo. Then mix down.
 
Yeah, for an audio CD I believe it must be a stereo file, 16-bit, at 44.1kHz.
 
Okay, but like I said, even though I save it mono, I still hear out of both speakers when I play it back. True, I have everything panned to center so maybe if I did some L, R panning I'd see a difference. I'll experiment and let you know..
 
I did some panning and low and behold, in mono it had no effect. It still came from both speakers. THanks for your help.
 
hawk said:
I did some panning and low and behold, in mono it had no effect. It still came from both speakers. THanks for your help.
Click to expand...

Right. All files, no matter how panned, when mixed down to mono will come out of both speakers because both L/R channels of your amplifier will be playing the exact same mono file. But when mixed down to stereo, each L/R channel will play the instruments panned the way they were during mixdown. So a guitar panned hard left will play hard left on the stereo file as well. A bass panned down the middle will always sound down the middle regardless of if it is in a mono or stereo mixdown.
 
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