Just got my Omni. Some questions...

[PostHuman]

The main output from my Omni TRS OUT 1 and 2 are going into my monitor speakers. Do I set the Omni OUTLVL to Speaker (+10dbu) or Line(+24dbu)?

What if I send the Omni to my Presonus Central Station to be able to switch through 3 different pairs of speakers. Digital out or TRS 1&2? which is better? Will the Presonus Central Station degrade sound quality at all? Should I just ditch the Presonus Central Station and just take the time to plug in each set separately when needed?

Thx in advance.

[nst7]

You won't want to use the digital in of the Central Station, because then you'll be using the Central Station's d/a converter, which is not nearly as good as the Omni's. As far as plugging into just the Central Station analog in's, you might just try it and do a comparison.

[chrisdee]

Doesn't the Omni have 8 outputs ?
You could hook up to 4 monitor pairs directly instead of potencially degrading the quality through your central station ?

[Bill Denton]

One question that is going to come up is whether you are using active or powered monitors.

Also, the Omni has a Main/Alt monitor switch on the front panel. Could you use this for the two sets of monitors you use most, and plug in the third set only when needed?

Do I set the Omni OUTLVL to Speaker (+10dbu) or Line(+24dbu)?

I found this really confusing when I first read this in the Omni manual (Disclosure: I really don't know very much about this stuff; hopefully someone who does will chime in with an explanation).

I was under the impression that active monitors were designed to accept a line level signal, but the Omni treats the monitor signal and the line level signal as two different things. Why, I don't know; hopefully we'll hear from somebody who does...

[nst7]

From page 26 of the manual:

"Output Level

"Select the appropriate Output Level for each of
the eight analog output channels. HD OMNI
provides two options for output levels:

"Speaker (+10 dBu) Select this option for output
channels connected directly to powered monitors.

"Line (+24 dBu) Select this option for output
channels connected to line-level devices (such
as an analog mixing console)."

So assuming you have powered monitors, you would set it for speaker. As Bill mentioned, I don't know why that would be any different from line level. Kind of strange.

[sndgeek]

I think this is the way you differentiate between "consumer" line level and "professional" line level. Most consumer gear runs 14dB quieter than pro gear (a la mixing boards, I/O's etc). Used to have to run an Aphex line converter to get my consumer gear (DVD player, iPod etc) to get proper level into ProTools.

[Bill Denton]

Originally Posted by sndgeek

I think this is the way you differentiate between "consumer" line level and "professional" line level. Most consumer gear runs 14dB quieter than pro gear (a la mixing boards, I/O's etc). Used to have to run an Aphex line converter to get my consumer gear (DVD player, iPod etc) to get proper level into ProTools.

That's the problem...in the US "pro" line level is +4 dBu, where consumer line level is -10 dBv.

Neither of these match up to what is shown in the Omni manual.

Further, in the specs for the Focal CMS 50 5" Nearfield Reference Monitor (just one I grabbed out of the air), it says "Adjustable sensitivity: +4dBu / 0 / -10dBV", which corresponds to the pro and consumer line levels (plus 0, just to confuse things).

And further still, just to confuse things even more, on the HD I/O, it lists the analog line outputs as +4 dBu.

Kinda makes me wonder if the numbers in the Omni manuals might be typos. Maybe Avid can chime in and help us out...

[Bill Denton]

Avid, could you give us a clarification on the levels?

[Siddhant Bhatia]

Bump!

Facing a very similar problem. Would love to know more about these levels. Avid?

[Sugarnutz]

If you set the Omni to +24 you will lose the monitor level control on the front panel as they become fixed outputs instead of variable.