which do i choose?

[drummerdude666]

i can get mackie HR624s (active) for £293. also i could get mackie HR626 for £336. Or theres the Mackie HR824 which i can get for £494

im looking for nearfield moniters in a room aprox. 12ft by 6ft. is it worth forking out a litlle bit more for the HR824s or will the HR524s do a good enough job? the RRP for the HR824s are £1429. And the HR626s have a RRP of £1426. but the latter might be to big for the room?
what do you guys think? im tring to spend around £300 but for such a huge saving on the RRP would t be worth getting the HR824s? is there much diffrence between them and the HR624s? all these moniters are new not second hand. im unsure of the right route to take. can anyone help?

 

[dantell]

I mix and master with 824

If you are mixing or mastering or both, you need a big enough woofer so you can hear the lows. Anything under 8" on a woofer just won't throw the bass out in that small of a room. If you mix your bass too thick from overcompensation, it will sound like shit on some systems. Been there.....done that. I like the Mackie 824 and I don't know the conversion rate on pounds vs the dollar right now. I don't even know what a quibb is.

 

[masteringhouse]

Where is the option for none of the above?

 

[Massive Master]

Where is the option for none of the above?

I didn't want to say it first...

 

[RhythmRmixd]

Why don't you guys (Massive Master and Masteringhouse) like the HR824's? I have a pair and I feel they've suited me quite nicely so far. I am nowhere near an experienced engineer and do not have years of experience dealing with multiple studio setups and monitors, but I would like to know what your reasoning is behind your statement. Is it for personal reasons? Are you saying that if I listen to hours of mixes on Mackie HR824's and become adapt to their translation of music, I'm still not getting a good product? Just curious.

Thanks

 

[masteringhouse]

Why don't you guys (Massive Master and Masteringhouse) like the HR824's? I have a pair and I feel they've suited me quite nicely so far. I am nowhere near an experienced engineer and do not have years of experience dealing with multiple studio setups and monitors, but I would like to know what your reasoning is behind your statement. Is it for personal reasons? Are you saying that if I listen to hours of mixes on Mackie HR824's and become adapt to their translation of music, I'm still not getting a good product? Just curious.

Thanks

I don't have direct experience with the 824s but I've worked with the M1s and the studio at the college I teach at uses the 624s. Both speakers do not translate well for me, in particular the 624s sound "crispy" and lack any type of bottom end that would serve as a reasonable monitor for mastering. My students also complain that it is very difficult to judge the amount of bottom in their mixes from these, and often end up with mixes that are bottom heavy on other systems. Additionally these speakers are fatiguing to my ears after about an hour of listening, not as much as NS-10s, but NS-10s at least translate better IMHO.

That said, your mileage may vary. If they work for your room/monitor combination use them. To draw an analogy, I can dig a hole with a broken shovel, just not as quickly and easily as I can with a good one. It doesn't mean that you can't work around the idiosyncracies or limitiations of any device. Even the best of them need to be worked around to some degree. I just prefer a monitoring system that's flat 20-20K (or beyond) and is revealing anything about a mix that isn't going to hold up. Just because a monitor "sounds good" it doesn't mean that it will make a good reference monitor.

 

[RhythmRmixd]

To draw an analogy, I can dig a hole with a broken shovel, just not as quickly and easily as I can with a good one. It doesn't mean that you can't work around the idiosyncracies or limitiations of any device. Even the best of them need to be worked around to some degree.

Would it be fair to say that all monitors have some sort of limitation that the listener needs to adjust for? If this is the case I can rest more easily knowing that ALL monitors are going to color sound to an extent. My responsiblity would be learning to adjust my ears (and ultimately my mix) to that coloration so that when something sounds a little "off" during a mixdown, I can rest assured, based on experience, that it will sound correct in a number of stereo systems after being burnt to cd.

 

[Massive Master]

Tom, are you sure we aren't brothers (which would be funny, as my brother's name is Tom)?

I'll pretty much echo all that on the 824's - Whenever I had to mix through them, I couldn't make something sound bad. They were pretty hyped, great for listening (for short periods, anyway) but I couldn't translate through them to save my life.

For mixing, I found them inaccurate. For mastering, totally unusable.

And yes, of course, YMMV.

 

[masteringhouse]

Tom, are you sure we aren't brothers (which would be funny, as my brother's name is Tom)?

I dunno, Dad may have gotten around

If not that brothers in audio I'm sure ...

 

[masteringhouse]

Would it be fair to say that all monitors have some sort of limitation that the listener needs to adjust for? If this is the case I can rest more easily knowing that ALL monitors are going to color sound to an extent. My responsiblity would be learning to adjust my ears (and ultimately my mix) to that coloration so that when something sounds a little "off" during a mixdown, I can rest assured, based on experience, that it will sound correct in a number of stereo systems after being burnt to cd.

Absolutely all monitors need to be "learned" along with the room your are listening to them in (speakers can vary widely from room to room and even position in a single room). The point is, that you want monitors for mastering that will allow you to hear the full range of the audio spectrum. You can't correct what you can't hear. On the mixing side, there is a bit more leeway, in both the room and the monitoring system. Mainly shooting for a good relative balance between all of the tracks and reserving the decisions on the overall tonality and dynamics for the mastering stage.

Some speakers seem to "translate" better when moving a mix from one system to another. In pro audio you want speakers that reveal flaws in a mix, not ones that necessarily make the mix sound it's best. To me that's the definition of a "reference" monitor.

 

[RhythmRmixd]

For mixing, I found them inaccurate. For mastering, totally unusable.

I don't think you could have told me anything more useless.

Thanks anyway.

 

[sile2001]

I don't think you could have told me anything more useless.

Thanks anyway.

Ummm....the last time I ever saw Massive say something useless was....oh wait....I've never seen that!!!!

If Massive deems a post worthy to be posted on, you should damn sure listen to what he has to say...

 

[RhythmRmixd]

Ummm....the last time I ever saw Massive say something useless was....oh wait....I've never seen that!!!!

If Massive deems a post worthy to be posted on, you should damn sure listen to what he has to say...

Thanks for your 2 cents. I guess I just want to kid myself into thinking there was a reason I spent $1300 on studio monitors.

 

[sile2001]

Well, if you're happy with what you get from them, then they are perfect for you. Just because they don't work for Massive or Blue Bear doesn't mean they don't work just fine for you.

 

[masteringhouse]

Thanks for your 2 cents. I guess I just want to kid myself into thinking there was a reason I spent $1300 on studio monitors.

Dude, I pissed away thousands more on gear that I was unhappy with later and is now collecting dust or serving as books ends. The idea of folks giving their opinions is to hopefully prevent this from happening elsewhere. If you value John's opinion (like I do), then it's worth taking heed.

I'll repeat what I've said elsewhere, rent before you buy when you can to make sure something works for you (even though it's recommended by top producer and engineer X). When you can't rent, ask folks who have used it and whose opinions you respect.

 

[RhythmRmixd]

The reason I said that was because I value your opinion (and Massive's), more so than most people on this forum, and was hoping to find ways to mix that work best with these monitors. If he was simply trying to advise me to avoid these speakers because they reproduce accurate sound poorly, then I can respect that.

Thanks

 

[Massive Master]

That's what the "YMMV" is for. I know plenty of people, with ears I respect, that love those things.

I'm not saying that they suck - I'm saying that they suck for me.

Just like my monitors - (B&W M-802's). There are guys that say I'm crazy for using the M's when I could be using the N's. There are others who give me a "thumbs up" and go "Yeah! Screw the N's!"

And with this, we're talking about differences that most people wouldn't even notice casually.

On top of that, the particular reason that I like the M's is that they seem more "picky" to me than the N's. If I were buying just to listen, it'd be the N's hands down.

So in short, I'm nto saying that you wasted your money - And I can certainly relate to Tom - I've spent in the low tens-of-thousands on gear that I either no longer use, or no longer have. All the monitors I've bought & sold over the years trying to find what I use now (just ask my wife when I had my personal speaker blowout sale )... Geez... And preamps, EQ's, compressors... SOFTWARE ... Good Lord! I'm starting to get depressed! Some works great, some sucks a$$, sometimes it takes months to figure out which.

Anyway, back to the point - If you mix on the Mackies and it sounds the way you want it to, then they're just what you need. I won't argue that at all.

After all, if there was only one "perfect" set of speakers, there'd only BE one set of speakers out there.

 

[darnold]

Everything sounds good until you hear something better.

The mids on the Mackie HR824s the 6 months that i had them were fatiguing, and everything i mixed with them turned out dull on them. Probably the hardest monitors ive had to learn to mix with.

I even like my old Tannoy Reveals better those the Mackies.

Also, sub size isnt really directly related to how low the speaker goes. My 10 inch subs in my car out power most 15 inch's that i hear by far and have a much better sound to them.

Danny

 

[RhythmRmixd]

Massive,

You gotta fill me in on the abbreviations "YMMV" next time! Remember, you're the wise one and I'm still the rookie. I like how you said, "most people wouldn't notice these differences casually", because your right, after so many years experience with listening and working with music, you develop ears that hear SO MUCH MORE than an average Joe Shmoe diddling with the cd player in his car. I can swallow the idea of knowing my HR824's have many faults of their own much easier, knowing that if I can get them to translate music into the way I want it to sound, then they'll get me there.

no hard feelings...

 

[Middleman]

If you're in the price range of the 824s and you can still return them, then listen to the Event Precision 8s. Side by side they blow the Mackie’s out of the water. I could type here and rave but suffice it to say they have absolutely stunning imaging.

Around $1200 they are the best value in monitors I have heard.

I see you're from Kansas, well originally I'm from Missouri, the "Show me state", so I'm skeptical by nature. I went to a GC and had them line them up side by side, the 624, 824 and the Event Precisions. The sound was so far above the Mackie’s it made them sound like bookshelf speakers in comparison.