Why use audio monitors if?

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SenryokuZokyoza

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When I was recording my last demo cd for my band, I used to burn 2, 3 test-CDs a day. Then I thought to myself, why burn
CDs if I'm able to link my computer to my living-room reciever via optical cable? Then I did it. Instead of burning reference CDs, I
hit play at the computer and run to my sofa, which is the place where I write down decisions about what to do over my songs...

Then comes this question: Why use special audio monitors if at the end of the process, the songs will be played thru regular home stereo speakers and stuff like this? It's like doing something that no one will be able to reproduce.

The same happens when I make audio for the web. Why record in 48Khz, 24 bits stereo if the damn web plug-in will reduce everything to 16KBpS telephone quality?
 
if you only intend to listen to your music on YOUR home stereo, that's a fine way to do it. but your neighbor's stereo will sound much different. the most important thing is to know the biases of the system you are mixing on, and adjust appropriately.

along the same lines, if your audio will only be heard over the web, then 24/48 is overkill. but i would certainly HOPE you could distribute your music at more than 16kbps.
 
Because home stereo speakers are all VERY different.

If you mix on your stereo speakers they will color your mix. Then when your mixs play back on someone elses stereo, it gets colored again. Its really easy to bizarre frequency problems when mixing and playing back on stereo speakers.

With monitors, your are reproducing your audio as accurately as you can afford. The theory is that if you mix on monitors, your mix will sound acceptable on most stereo system. It will sound DIFFERENT on each system because the systems are different, but your levels and EQ will be largely consistent.

It takes a while of getting used to monitors, though. They sound very different then stereo speakers. I played CD's through mine for a long time to get used to how they reproduce the sound. We are so used to hearing the affects of home stereo speakers and EQ's that it takes some getting used to hear accurately reproduced audio.

As to the quality issue: the higher quality you record at, the better your end product at any resolution. You can then use the same mix for high quality playback on your own computer, dithering down to CD quality, and crunching through the mp3 grinder.

I LOVE listening to my tunes at full 24 bit /44.1 in Pro Tools. Makes me cry when I have to dither down to 16 and put it on CD sometimes.

Take care,
Chris
 
SenryokuZokyoza said:
When I was recording my last demo cd for my band, I used to burn 2, 3 test-CDs a day. Then I thought to myself, why burn
CDs if I'm able to link my computer to my living-room reciever via optical cable? Then I did it. Instead of burning reference CDs, I
hit play at the computer and run to my sofa, which is the place where I write down decisions about what to do over my songs...

Then comes this question: Why use special audio monitors if at the end of the process, the songs will be played thru regular home stereo speakers and stuff like this? It's like doing something that no one will be able to reproduce.

The same happens when I make audio for the web. Why record in 48Khz, 24 bits stereo if the damn web plug-in will reduce everything to 16KBpS telephone quality?

I think you are on to something. If you could hook up all your neighbors stereos to your recorder than you could just go door to door and do monitor checks.

I too find that all that digital resolution is way overrated. Even MP3 takes too damn long to transfer over the web. My friends and I now just use our phone voice mail to distribute music to eachother. That way you can call up your voice mail and listen to any song you want. It's a bit of a pain though because you always have to start with the first song and you have to use two different phones for stereo and make sure that both the voice mail systems are in sync.

Anybody know a good stereo voicemail system with random access?
 
Re: Re: Why use audio monitors if?

TexRoadkill said:

Anybody know a good stereo voicemail system with random access?

no, but i'm looking forward to getting Antares Monitor Modeler to hook up to my current voicemail
 
Thanks guys.. I think I was confusing about these details about "coloring" the sound. Makes total sense. Tks.
 
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