Effect sends Pre or Post fader

[Raoul23]

Just a little discussion on what people are using most of the time and when they prefer to use Pre/Post fader. I used to alway use Post fader which will affect the level going into the delay, reverb etc, but for some reason ive now turned to Pre fader. I'd just like to get everyones views and opinions on this

[Stig Eliassen]

The only times I use pre-fader sends are when printing tracks to new audio tracks, creating special FX, and setting up cue mixes.

[Bill Denton]

Back in the old console days, pre-fader was frequently used for things like headphone monitoring, while post-fader was used for effects such as reverb.

Using pre-fader allowed the creation of custom headphone mixes (think "more me") that would not be affected by fader level changes. For example, the drummer might want to hear a louder bass guitar than would be used in the "real" mix.

Using post-fader for reverbs allows a more "realistic" use of reverb. If you were using room reverb, if the instrument gets softer, so does the level of that instrument in the total room reverb. By using a post-fader send to your reverb, when you pull the fader down the amount of that signal being sent to the reverb is reduced, thereby preserving the balance of the instruments in the reverb.

Of course, you can do whatever you want to in order to achieve the desired sound...

[Raoul23]

If you are sending all your drums to a parallel compressed sub mix to blend in with the dry drum buss would you use pre or post. Obviously using post would send the same mix as the dry drum bus to the parallel bus or would you want a slightly different mix to be sent to the parallel drum bus