Headphones and Reference Monitors
For most of us, it would be hard to imagine working in a studio without being able to hear anything. Besides the importance of having a good ear to achieve a mix, you’re most likely going to need some sort of audio monitor setup for your Cubase studio. The cheapest alternative could be as simple as using the speakers built into your computer, some external PC speakers, or a pair of cheap headphones.
If you are planning on doing a final mix (making CDs) from your Cubase studio or recording live instruments, having a good set of reference monitors and/or headphones is a must. Most professional studios have not just one good set of reference monitors; they have multiple sets. Some professional engineers are so particular about their monitors they actually take them from studio to studio.
Note
The reference monitors that I’m referring to are speakers that are designed to truly represent audio. A lot of consumer speakers are built to “color” or enhance sound. This coloration effect makes it difficult to judge the true sound of a recording or mix. The word “flat” is often used to describe a good true pair of reference monitor speakers. Flat means that there is very little tonal coloration from the speaker itself.
There are a lot of choices out there when it comes to selecting good reference monitors. A monitoring setup consists of an amplifier and a speaker. Both of these elements can dramatically affect the sound of a mix or recording. Twenty years ago, the idea of using a speaker cabinet with a built-in amplifier was unheard of for studio-monitoring purposes. Today, most people are using these all-in-one monitor setups mostly because they sound great and are very easy to use.
Truth be told, your ears are the only real judge for what monitors you need. If you’re new to mixing and you don’t really understand how to listen for certain characteristics in a recording, you can spend $400 or $10,000 on a pair of monitors, and it may not make much of a difference in the sound when it’s all said and done. Most of the best engineers in the world would rather die than mix on a pair of all-in-one monitors. But if you’re mixing in a garage or bedroom, or you have limited mixing experience, do yourself a favor and buy the all-in-one monitors. It’s hard enough to tune a room to a pair of monitors, let alone tune an amp to a pair of speakers. If you’ve been doing this for a while, you probably know where to look for great monitors, and you also know that a set of great monitors can cost more than the rest of your entire Cubase studio.
I’ve been using a pair of Yamaha MSP-5 amplified monitors (see Figure 2.10) for almost seven years, and I still love the way they sound. Before the Yamaha MSP-5s, I used some Tannoys and some Alesis monitors powered by a Peavey Studio reference amp. I’ve also mixed on some very nice Westlake BBSM-6 monitors. I have to admit that those Westlake monitors are probably the best I’ve ever heard, but I’m still very happy with the $500 pair of Yamaha MSP-5 monitors. Whatever you do, don’t just rush out and buy a pair of monitors without listening to them. If you live far away from a music store, make a special trip to a store where you can spend time listening and comparing several different types of monitors within your budget. I was a big fan of Genelec monitors, but the price of the Yamahas versus their sound quality made me choose them instead. If you plan to do a lot of mixing and recording in your studio, spend a little extra on the monitors. They will make a big difference to your Cubase studio working experience.
Figure 2.10. The Yamaha MSP-5 all-in-one reference monitors.
If you live in an apartment or a place where you can’t record or mix music without affecting the lives of someone else around you, you need headphones. Years ago I was in a situation where using headphones was the only way I could mix. At the time, I was very frustrated because I’d found that headphones made it nearly impossible for me to achieve a good mix. There are a few who may have a different opinion regarding this issue, but I believe that most pros will agree that it’s very hard to get a good mix using headphones. I finally decided I needed to look for some better headphones. I went to all the music stores, and a lot of consumer pro audio stores, and I couldn’t find anything that I liked. Even the best studios in the world use headphones that are not well suited for mixing. That’s because most of the time headphones are used for monitoring a performance. In a lot of cases, they just need to be able to get loud or prevent bleed-through when using microphones during a recording.
After a lot of demos, I finally found that the best pair of mixing headphones for me was a high-end pair of consumer headphones: Sennheiser HD590s (see Figure 2.11). At the time, using these headphones, I was able to get a mix to at least 95 percent so that I could finish the mix quickly using the reference monitors. These headphones are also great for monitoring while recording vocals. If you’re serious about mixing and you have to use headphones, you shouldn’t settle for headphones that color the sound in such a way that you can’t distinguish parts clearly. On the other hand, if you plan on recording a lot of different bands in your Cubase studio, don’t rush out and buy the most expensive headphones for the bands’ monitors because you’ll find that your headphones will become used and abused and you may have to replace them frequently. If you’re recording live rock drummers, in a lot of cases you’ll need headphones that are just plain loud.
Figure 2.11. Sennheiser HD590 headphones.
Another difference in using headphones as opposed to the all-in-one reference monitors is that headphones need amplification. You may own a sound card that has a headphone output, or even multiple headphone outputs. You can use headphone splitters to run multiple sets of headphones off one headphone output, but as you do this, you lose a lot of signal to your headphones. If you need to use multiple headphones (for instance, you’ll be recording multiple musicians at the same time), you’ll most likely need a headphone amplifier. The size of your headphone amp depends on the number of headphones you need to run at once. One of the great things about using a headphone amp is that most of them have volume controls for each output, which enables listening at whatever volume the user desires. A very simple and practical headphone amp available on the market today is the PreSonus HP4 (see Figure 2.12). The HP4 has been designed to work well with DAWs so that you can run your sound card’s main output into the HP4 and then control the volume of both your reference monitors and four individual headphone outputs. The best part about it is the fact that it retails for around $100 and sounds fairly clean (doesn’t color the sound going to the reference monitors or headphones).
Figure 2.12. The PreSonus HP4 headphone amp.
