Are you using a horrortone or similar mix cube?
 

I'm several chapters into an excellent book about mixing by Mike Senior called Mixing Secrets and he recommends mixing partly in mono using a single mix cube type speaker like an Auratone, Avantone Mix Cube, etc. Is anyone here using a mono single driver speaker for checking mixes? In what ways do you find it helpful as compared to your stereo monitors?

In my room I have four systems: the primary Urei 811b/c system built into the soffit and tuned to the room, a pair of Auratone 5C cubes, a pair of Samsung TV speakers previously mounted onto the room's monitor but now mounted next to our newer monitor on the soffit, and a Bag End time aligned and subwoofed 5.1 array.

I typically mix on the primary array but compare on all the others. I also compare the mixes in mono, collapsing the mix via the monitor section of the console. All of our rooms have these smaller monitors. Some of the rooms in the complex feature Avantone monitors rather than Auratones because the speakers were purchased while Auratone wasn't in production.

Incidentally, my home has become something of a home for wayward Auratones. I've got two pairs of 5Cs, a pair of 5RC road cubes, and a pair of 5W wedges. Why? I have no idea. I seem to always be there when someone is replacing their speakers and I saved them from the crusher.

http://www.in2guitar.com/auratones/roadcubes1.jpg

http://www.in2guitar.com/images2/auratones.jpg

More about Auratones at my site, HERE.

Bob

Nice web page. The Quincy Jones ad is great!

I'm using small Genelec monitors in my home studio and I have an audiophile system in another part of the the house that lets me check the low bass. I also use my car system and iPhone to check mixes.

According to the book I'm reading you can make better mix level judgements by listening to a summed signal on a single mono speaker than by mixing on stereo monitors alone. He also points out that in mix cube speakers you have a single driver which means no crossover distortion in the midrange. And no cabinet port means better time coherence. The author almost has me convinced to give a small single driver mono speaker a try.

If I decide to pull the trigger and give it a try I'll probably go for the Avantone cube because of the convenience of having a built in amp. It gets very good reviews. Are there any users here?

I agree with everything except the bit about the port. Auratones and the like have so little low end that's it's easy to make mistakes. And the enclosure is just a box, with no science or "design" put into it. I built myself some speakers that address these issues, and I'm thrilled with them. There's a lengthy post about it on a different site that rhymes with "futz" but I can't link to it without violating Terms of Service.

The amp is convenient, yes, but I think the real Auratones sound better. And a good-sized power amp makes a real difference, even at very low volume.

The biggest two takeaways are:

1) Get to know your monitor speakers so you know how they are influencing you. It is their job to influence you. It is your job to decide how much!

2) Check mono compatibility. I can't tell you how important it is. I remember the original mix (since fixed) for Paul Simon's "Mother and Child Reunion." The producer and engineer used a trick to make the tremelo guitar part seem wider. They patched the track to two channels and inverted the phase of one. As a result, that darn guitar seemed to come from EVERYWHERE. However, if you pushed your headphone plug halfway in, like I did once, you got combined mono. That out-of-phase guitar DISAPPEARED, all except for the reverb which lingered. When I started studying recording that was the prime example for the effects of out of phase audio when summed. They remixed it and put the guitar on the left.

So you don't plan to publish your song in mono and don't care if it isn't mono-compatible? There are just things that just happen that you don't have control over, such as YouTube and others collapsing to mono to save bandwidth or simply doing it accidentally. I did a whole concert show with the best mobile music recording truck on the East Coast. We recorded it multi-track and carefully mixed it in stereo. The network aired it in mono. If the silly thing is going to be stored and played by anyone else, seek mono compatibility and verify it at the mix stage.

Bob

Exactly what Bob said^^^!
Learning your monitors is key.
Checking your mix in mono is key. Phase issues can happen with a non-duplicated/tricked part, too - two guitar tracks panned left and right with similar (but different) strumming can have a phasey sound issue when mono-ed.

Like a lot of engineers, I remember having the "standard" monitor setup: Genelec 1031a and Yamaha NS10 sets. Mixed for ages on those. After awhile I gave up on the NS10s. I just didn't need them...especially after I moved to DynAudio 3-ways instead of the Genelecs. I may be the only guy in existence to find the Genelec high-end just a little funky. The DynAudios are better for me to really hear what's really going on with the top end.

I do check for mono compatibility - but usually only when I've done something I suspect will mess with mono-compatibility. I know some heavy hitters who say "screw mono - I never check". And I mean HEAVY hitters (onto Grammy #7 kind of heavy). So, take that for whatever it's worth.

I think 99% of it is just knowing your monitoring environment really well. When you know exactly how everything will translate you don't get worried when you send a mix out. You're confident that what you mixed is what people will hear.

Nope, you aren't alone. :D After a short while they feel raspy on the upper end and eventually I feel like they are ripping my head off.

Bob

Agreed. Ear needles.

Thank you both! I knew someone else had to hear it.

Back on topic, I pulled the trigger yesterday on an Avantone Mix Cube from an internet seller. It should be here in a few days and I'm looking forward to putting it to work in my studio as soon as it arrives.

Until I began reading Mike Senior's mixing book it just never occurred to me to add a low fi mono mix cube to my home studio. I have a feeling that the mono mix cube will either improve my mixes or speed up the mixing process or both.

By the way guys, as an audiophile I have always hated Genelecs, Auratones, NS-10s etc. all of which are recording industry standards. Recently I bought some modestly priced Genelec speakers to use for backup while my more expensive Focal Solo 6 Be monitors were out for repairs. I wound up keeping the M040 monitors and selling the Solo 6's.

I can't say I like the way my Genelecs sound but I do find they speed up the mix process for me. For desktop placement in my spare bedroom studio the Genelecs are the right tool for the job. They have eq switches to tailor the mid bass and low end for desk top use and that helps quite a bit.

The Focal monitors sound nicer than my Genelecs but when I had them on my mix desk their mid bass was tubby in a way that made mixing difficult. In a larger, better room and on real speaker stands I'd prolly stick with the Solo 6 monitors.

A while back I worked at Stereophile magazine and that was an education. I got to experience state of the art analogue and digital playback. It's the kind of equipment you see in mastering facilities but not in recording studios. It comes down to horses for courses. Nearfield monitors for mixing and hifi playback for mastering. I think the mix cube will be a useful addition to my home studio for mixing.

IMHO if you mix on Genelecs you need a hifi playback system too. I couldn't be happy with just Genelecs and horrortones. They are not fun to listen to compared with something like this.

You'll have to let us know what you think...it might inspire me to unbox my NS10s.

I agree with you on the Focal Solo Bes being a little "boxy" in the low-mids. I imagine having them on your desk enhances that quality. I have noticed they perform better when decoupled from everything on their own stands. If you have the room to spread out like that. Which brings up another big factor that a lot of people forget to add to the equation: room size.

My mix room is 19x25. 3-way monitors give me really accurate monitoring, much more than a 2-way system. But in a smaller room I might cause more problems than I solve with a 3-way system...and have to make a much larger RFZ that could impact other aspects of the sound such as imaging and depth.

I guess it just emphasized the "there is no one size fits all" solutions in our world (audio engineering or guitars).

Keep us posted. I'm curious to know if you find benefit from the new setup.

Well, I've just unboxed and hooked up my mono Avantone MixCube and it's a revelation!

It's immediately obvious why this mono cube approach is recommended for balancing mixes, setting reverb levels, checking for distortion on the vocal, etc. There's no crossover distortion and mid-range is what the cube is all about.

Listening to some old stereo mixes on my mono cube I can hear that I'll be revisiting those mixes and tweaking a bit here and there. Getting a mono mix cube may well be the most important purchase I've made since getting RealTraps. You can judge balance so easily it feels like it must be cheating somehow.

I'll report further here when I get more time. To be continued...

Here’s a pic of the Auratone mono speaker I bought. I hooked it up and listened to my mixes on it, all I can say is wow, for the most part they sound terrible !! This speaker strips away all the glamour and great sound of my regular monitors. It’s mostly a mid range speaker, all the glorius bass and high end is gone…It shows the mixes in their true stage which is terrible. The mixes have to sound good on the Auratone, because this really shines a bright light on them. I was thinking my mixes sounded okay, but they sound like crap on the Auratone. I also listened to some commercial cd recordings that were properly mixed and they sounded just fine on the Auratone. Wow what an eye opener…This Auratone was an fantastic investment !!! My regular monitors were giving me a false sense that my mixes were good. Boy does this work good !!!


[IMG]https://i.imgur.com/mEuw4yA.jpg?1[/IMG]


[IMG]https://i.imgur.com/DTjljI3.jpg?1[/IMG]

I'm glad to hear from another happy convert. Before I tried adding my mix cube to my desk I was skeptical. WOW! I just wish I'd done it a lot sooner. It's an amazingly helpful mix tool!!!

I like your lava lamp. That's going to be my next studio upgrade.