monitors vs. headphones

[AhwatukeeComputerRepair]

You can mix with headphones as long as you know what you need to compensate for. While ideally you want monitors for a true reference headphones can be used if monitors are not available.

One thing to look for if you're going to purchase headphones is to make sure they are flat frequency and not boosting the low end or the highs. For example don't buy Beats and expect to mix since they have a boost in the lows and really are not good for giving you a true sound.

[Darryl Ramm]

You can make it easier on yourself to mix on headphones if you use headphones with a cross feed circuit. Such as Meier Audio provides in their headphone amps. http://www.meier-audio.homepage.t-online.de/ Grace Design was licensing Meier's cross-feed technology for their monitoring products (http://www.gracedesign.com/products/...ntrollers.html) but it looks like may have gone with their own xfeed technology with current products. Either way headphone amp/monitoring products from both companies are *very* impressive. And yes obviosuly you are goign to work as well on a variety of monitors for critical stuff.

Flipping between different cross-feed levels and turning it off entirely (so you what what an average consumer will hear on their headphones) as you check things is a good idea. Personally I just can not listen for long periods of time to a headphone that is not using cross-feed. Far too tiring and distracting, and has the issues that JFreak described well...

[Amack]

Aren't there any good cross feed plugins?

Originally Posted by Darryl Ramm

You can make it easier on yourself to mix on headphones if you use headphones with a cross feed circuit. Such as Meier Audio provides in their headphone amps. http://www.meier-audio.homepage.t-online.de/ Grace Design was licensing Meier's cross-feed technology for their monitoring products (http://www.gracedesign.com/products/...ntrollers.html) but it looks like may have gone with their own xfeed technology with current products. Either way headphone amp/monitoring products from both companies are *very* impressive. And yes obviosuly you are goign to work as well on a variety of monitors for critical stuff.

Flipping between different cross-feed levels and turning it off entirely (so you what what an average consumer will hear on their headphones) as you check things is a good idea. Personally I just can not listen for long periods of time to a headphone that is not using cross-feed. Far too tiring and distracting, and has the issues that JFreak described well...

[mesaone]

Originally Posted by Amack

Aren't there any good cross feed plugins?

There are, but they only give an approximation.

Some try to emulate the head-related transfer function but fall flat. The physical interactions between source and space and ears are so complicated, it's understandable when "faking" it doesn't work out.

Amack, have you auditioned Beyerdynamic DT990 Pro headphones? You should. This is as close as you can get to being "in the room" without DSP or special processing.

[Amack]

mesaone,

I think they would/should give a better approximation than the Meier analog filter/summer approach - and certainly offer more control-ability.

Thanks for the tip on the headphones. At least for now my son seems quite happy with his DT 880 600 Ohm Premiums. They sound pretty good to me too - which apparently doesn't say much. After testing them (and others) at http://www.audiocheck.net/soundtests_headphones.php and doing the hearing tests at http://myhearingtest.net/ it appears that my 63 year old ears likely don't work nearly as well as my 20 year old son's. I'm trying to get him to do the tests too.

As you know, my son is the music guy. I'm just a retired EE that gave up on the "Golden Ear" thing ~ 20 years ago - lucky thing I guess. I prefer quantitative measurement to subjective listening tests whenever possible - especially for electronics/software. Regardless, I started the "DAW System/Subsystem Performance Evaluation" thread showing both approaches - because sound quality matters!

Amack

Originally Posted by mesaone

There are, but they only give an approximation.

Some try to emulate the head-related transfer function but fall flat. The physical interactions between source and space and ears are so complicated, it's understandable when "faking" it doesn't work out.

Amack, have you auditioned Beyerdynamic DT990 Pro headphones? You should. This is as close as you can get to being "in the room" without DSP or special processing.