Monitors for a non treated room?

[zenwolf]

I'm living in a 2 bedroom flat and my DAW is setup in my 2nd bedroom, which also belongs to my 11 year old! So setting up some serious room sound treatment is a bit out of the question. The room space is nice, I have an entire wall which is about 12ft wide, it isn't cluttered, but there is other furniture pieces behind me which might reflect sound back.

My question is how important the mxing space is to your mix? Obviously I know it IS important, but I'm more concerned because I would like to upgrade my monitors, looking at the Adam A7's, and also bring in a UAD2 card, but I don't want to throw that money away if it is pointless to try and use these things in a less than ideal mixing environment.

Just for comparison though, I am upgrading from some stinker Behringer Truths I've had for 5 years and I don't own any serious mixing/mastering plugs other than those that come with Logic. If adding these would make a substantial impact despite the room inadequacies then I'm happy to invest.

Cheers!

[Mr.HOLMES]

Good cans and this:

Product Announcement: Sound Performance Lab

It not bad personally I dont like such speaker simulations but it is better as listening thorough normal cans.

Take care for your ears have longer breaks if you use cans.

[zenwolf]

That looks like a cool product, though they haven't released the price yet. I called my dealer here to find out more and they didn't have it listed yet. I know their Volume2 controller is close to $500...so I imagine this running much more...for me, if it gets too close to the $1k mark between this and a cans upgrade then it seems better to invest in the adams in hope I get a decent mixing room someday. plus this is really untested...not sure about any other stereo field simulators that people are using successfully on headphones.

[Mr.HOLMES]

I am going to try this one out myself.
SPL and I we have constant flow of Informations.

I did not liked their Phonitor it is a simulation too build very high end and around 1.8 K
I am going to buy the 2Control because my Central Station sucks.

The 2 Control will be released soon.

[macc]

That thing looks just right if you can't justify a Phonitor

Let us know the price if/when you find out, please

[staudio]

Sennheiser HD600 headphones.

[zenwolf]

Looks like retail listing is going for 499 Euros or about $635 US - at least if the dollar keeps its value. So, I'd imagine knocking $50-100 off for the actual sale price. It looks cool, but I really wonder how practical it is for mixing. What cans would you pair it with? I'm currently using Beyerdynamic DT 770's.

[zenwolf]

Hmm, those Sennheiser HD600's look very nice!

[Mr.HOLMES]

Overall you may aslo could have nice monitors.
But no room treatment for this price.

I would go with this headphones:




AKG K 701have blown me away at my retailers store.
Not cheap but comfortable and great in sound and as non closed also good to wear over a longer period.

[zenwolf]

Now those also look very good. Amazon sells them for far less than proaudio shops. I could see using these with the 2Control and getting some great mixng results without the treated room. Certainly no absolute replacement for monitors an a good room, but decent. I'm a little concerned with long use on my ears. Still, for probably $800 I could get both and then later buy into some monitors when I have a proper room.

[Mr.HOLMES]

Originally Posted by zenwolf

Now those also look very good. Amazon sells them for far less than proaudio shops. I could see using these with the 2Control and getting some great mixng results without the treated room. Certainly no absolute replacement for monitors an a good room, but decent. I'm a little concerned with long use on my ears. Still, for probably $800 I could get both and then later buy into some monitors when I have a proper room.

What I would do because you can not mix a long time under cans.
Buy the cans as well as the SPL Control Unit and a cheap car speaker pair.

Set the car speakers up so that you are sitting in the near field.
My neighborer is doing mixes on cheap car speakers in combinations with cans... he is always checking back on the car speakers.

And you know what he knows these tiny little shit speakers so well that he is doing great mixes on them.

[zenwolf]

Good idea for checking the mix...I wonder if my tiny little behringer truth shit speakers would cut it -- I think the car speakers would be better.

[Jonboy79]

I use Event 20/20BAS V2's in my untreated room and they really translate nicely. I rarely ever have to check a mix on other sources with these monitors. I'm not sure if they still sell them but you might still find them used. Make sure they're the V2's though, I hear they're very different from the first version of the 20/20bas'.

[Peacock]

Originally Posted by Mr.HOLMES

Overall you may aslo could have nice monitors.
But no room treatment for this price.

I would go with this headphones:




AKG K 701have blown me away at my retailers store.
Not cheap but comfortable and great in sound and as non closed also good to wear over a longer period.

Our main engineer brought a pair of these in recently and I was shocked at how they sounded almost exactly like the monitors.

[zenwolf]

Here's an update on the 2Control from SPL which was reccommended in this thread. Audiomidi.com says they will carry it in about 2 weeks and it will run $635 US. I am going to pick one up when it comes out as the reviews for the SPL Phonitor have been positive and this uses simular tech for "headphone monitoring". I also grabbed a pair of AKG K702's off B&HPhoto for $379 -- figured the swappable cable would make upgrading easier. Total should be about $1k for everything.

[Greg Curtis]

Originally Posted by Mr.HOLMES

I would go with this headphones:



AKG K 701have blown me away at my retailers store.
Not cheap but comfortable and great in sound and as non closed also good to wear over a longer period.

I just got a pair of these, and they are fantastic! They need about 20-40 hours of break-in (they sound incredibly bright out of the box), but after that they are so sweet. A/B'ing them with Beyer 770s (boomy, cloudy) and Sony 7506 (bright as hell) really shows how much more accurate they are. But they are open-backed, so no use for recording musicians.

They require a strong headphone amplifier, as well.


But I don't think that they could be used as primary monitors for mixing!

Greg

.

[Chaellus]

some high quality headphones and some cheap monitors to regulate volume between instruments...

[zenwolf]

Originally Posted by Greg Curtis

But I don't think that they could be used as primary monitors for mixing!

Greg

.

Well, as I don't have a proper mixing room I am not willing to spend the money on a serious monitor upgrade. I think the AKG K702's with the SPL 2Control should give me a WAY more accurate mix vs my crappy Behringer Truths. And I think it will serve better than using monitors in a bad room. Maybe not perfect but leaps and bounds better than what I am coming from. In time I will get a room to myself to treat and mix properly in.

[zenwolf]

I guess the question really is if you were in my shoes and had $1000 to improve your monitoring situation what would you invest in? Monitors for an untreated room with no chance for a treated room anytime soon? Or awesome cans and the 2Control? Or some third option I'm not thinking of? I would like to get the UAD2 card to add some decent plugins to my Logic setup but need an accurate monitoring solution.

[u b k]

hang on... it's okay to have a daw setup in the room, but putting a couple of traps in the corners is out of the question?

you don't need to straddle the corners, which takes up hella space, you can simply place them parallel to the wall and have them touch in the corners, forming an L shape. total loss of real estate = 5" each way. if you can hang another trap over the mix position, bob's your uncle, and it'll be 100x better for your mixing than any monitor at any price.

me, i'd be negotiating with the 11 year old. in my experience, they're extremely flexible and very clear on what they want in order to make a deal happen.


gregoire
del
ubk
.

[zenwolf]

Originally Posted by u b k

hang on... it's okay to have a daw setup in the room, but putting a couple of traps in the corners is out of the question?

you don't need to straddle the corners, which takes up hella space, you can simply place them parallel to the wall and have them touch in the corners, forming an L shape. total loss of real estate = 5" each way. if you can hang another trap over the mix position, bob's your uncle, and it'll be 100x better for your mixing than any monitor at any price.

me, i'd be negotiating with the 11 year old. in my experience, they're extremely flexible and very clear on what they want in order to make a deal happen.


gregoire
del
ubk
.

Thanks for that advice...good to hear someone not opposed to mixing in an 11 year old's bedroom Seriously though, I think what you are suggesting could work well. Maybe I will rethink my Adam A7's purchase.

Cheers!