Need recommendations for active monitors for many purposes

[astaroth]

The fella at sinamex was saying its probably not a good idea to get a sub due to simply being unable to mix sufficient bass into bass heavy songs like metal which is what im doing, and getting the music to play well in lousier systems. I dunno but it does make sense to me.

I have went out to listen to the wharfdale, the krk and the Yamaha hs80m. And I'm actually leaning towards the more transparent and somewhat harsher sound of the hs80m. Good mixes really sounds good on it and bad mixes you can tell immediately, and I was very surprised by that. the KRK was a little more musical, easier on the ears to listen to regularly for music and such. the wharfdale was underwhelming, not gonna consider that at all. Gonna try the Yamaha HS50M as well before making a final decision.

 

[astaroth]

I've finally decided on the HS50M, bought from a very nice gentleman. Ultimately preferred its more analytical and honest nature to the somewhat coloured sound of the KRK.

 

[kongwee]

My complain about HS they cannot push to loud volume.
This is where the harshness come in.

 

[astaroth]

That I have to agree, probably leave them softer as much as possible

 

[squarehero]

Not to pour cold water on your purchase, but Yamaha HS50m doesn't really sound that good to my ears, mostly due to the lack of bass and fuzzy highs.

On the comment of the Sinamex fellow, without proper low end extension, you won't be able to mix bass at all. You will overboost your bass and have very boomy mixes. On lousier systems, the PA person/installer has probably optimized the sound to his favourite tracks. I'm willing to bet a lot of these tracks are probably well mixed ones if the PA person has any perception of good sound. If this is the case, he is probably already EQ'ing his system to sound good with these good tracks.

If you mix too much bass in your tracks (due to not being able to hear bass), your tracks will sound overly boomy. In the case of bad bass mixing, you could also limit the maximum volume of your track when played back on the system. The PA person will have to cut your bass to get better sound or more loudness. And, as we all know, the less EQ'ing you have to do, the better.

 

[squarehero]

For proper subwoofer integration with satellite speakers, you need a subwoofer with sufficient phase control e.g. continuous phase control 0 to 180 degrees.

Integration of subwoofer into satellites is very easy imo once you know how to do it.

 

[astaroth]

Well honestly I just went with my ear and listened to the one I liked best and the HS50M happened to be it haha. Using it together with my custom in ears to make sure the mix is good on all kinds of systems. I'll just try it out and see how it goes.

 

[kongwee]

Well.... HS sound more toward home system, so I am not surprise people like it.
HS perform better in less controlled environment.
Even better than it own MSP line in this environment.
I own MSP and it is not easy to setup in normal home.
Astaroth as you get more work, your ear start to be every picky.
Good for your work, but bad cos you will be a gear freak. XD

 

[squarehero]

All the best with your music Astaroth. In the end, if you know what to look out for, you should be fine.

I also do suggest using a good spectrum analyzer to double check the bass region. And probably some very simple acoustic treatment just to get the imaging good for mixing purposes.

 

[astaroth]

haha im no stranger to upgrading, upgrade-titis is a fact of life. May I know what is a spectrum analyzer and how do I use it?

 

[squarehero]

It's something like
Voxengo Span
or
Blue Cat's FreqAnalyst

Basically, it allows you to see what you're mixing. It can be useful when you cannot hear the something properly like the bass frequencies. Study the responses of the songs you like and try to achieve a similar response. This may not always guarantee a good mix but will at least guarantee a certain amount of "listenability".

 

[astaroth]

Oh yes I have this on the Ozone vst, did not realise its called a spectrum analyzer haha

 

[Fauxfire]

Hey guys!

I need some help on studio monitors as well! I'm looking for a pair of monitor speakers to hook up to my Line 6 UX2!
Purpose is for home recording, guitars and vocals!

My is budget is about $150 tops, not sure if this is realistic or not! I've looked at some from Citymusic's website, apparently they carry Kurzweil KA-40 and Wharfdales! However, last i checked they do not carry the Kurzweils anymore! So any reccomendations guys?

Thanks lots!

 

[squarehero]

There is no monitor speakers sub 150 that I have heard of that will give you adequate monitoring quality.

If you have about 500 to spend, then there are some options.

 

[Fauxfire]

Hmmn I might expand my budget a little bit, but $200 is the max i'll go. I was checking out the Wharfedale Pro Diamond Studio 8.1 Pro Active the other day. Sounds pretty good, but then again I may not know the difference. What's your take on this?

 

[squarehero]

The internet seems to like the Wharfedale. I have no experience listening to it but looking at the speaker design, I can say that the design is very old and doesn't take into consideration everything new that has happened in the speaker world since 2004. The reviews probably came from way back. Here are my comments on the design.

The Wharfedale speaker cabinet is nothing more than a cuboid that you stuff some drivers into, make some crossover circuits and call it a day. It doesn't have any consideration for speaker baffle diffraction and doesn't make use of any waveguide to reduce high frequency beaming. It uses Kevlar woofers which everyone seems to like these days and a standard soft dome (silk?) tweeter you find in products from similar companies like KRK.

The port is nothing special and may induce some port noise (you probably will only notice this at pretty loud listening levels). The speaker sensitivity is 86db/W/m which is quite low but that is not much an issue if you don't listen too loud. Amplifier spec is not too bad for the price but there is no statistic on intermodulation distortion so it's hard to judge how good it is.

Anyway, no, I wouldn't recommend it as a monitor speaker.

 

[astaroth]

I sampled the bigger version, it was rather woofy and lacked definition. Probably try and save a little and get a KRK second hand.