Only hearing music out of the left headphones

[Darryl Ramm]

Yes and you have three people pointing out that you are most likely just recording a mono mic to a stereo audio track and getting exactly the behavior expected. What happens when you record a mono mic to a mono audio track as you should be doing?

[MusicGirl]

Well, I was playing with it trying to get in to work and now it's saying: (The track could not be recorded-enabled because it doesn't have an active input and output assignment) It's so confusing!

[Darryl Ramm]

You really need to start with following along with an introductory tutorial, there are many on YouTube. Or look at a book or online course. And ultimately look at the Pro Tools Reference Guide. Pro Tools is just far too complex to try to learn by random walking your way through.

So what do you have the input of that (hopefully mono) track set to? It should be whatever mic input on the interface you are using.

If the input options showing up in the input selector button don't look right check the playback engine is set to your interface and then go into setup>IO and click on the default button on the input and output pages.

[MusicGirl]

Okay, I can still hear my old recording out of one ear, but when I record nothing in mono now it's not recording my voice and I can't hear the echo or nothing!

Can you tell me how my I/O setting should be set up as?

Thanks!

[Darryl Ramm]

Start with a new empty session. Create a stereo audio track. Drag any old stereo mp3 or similar music file (that you know what it sounds like in stereo) to that track and press play. Do you hear that in both You L and R headphones and does it sound OK?

[MusicGirl]

Yes I started a blank session and it only play in one ear!

[musicman691]

Originally Posted by MusicGirl

Yes I started a blank session and it only play in one ear!

Go to the preferences page where you select inputs/outputs/busses and hit the 'default' button on every page.

Can you play the PT11 demo session and does that give you sound out of both sides of your headphones?

But like Darryl said - get yourself a good book or check out the multitude of tutorials out there. Groove 3 has some good ones but you have to pay for them. As to a book a good one for newbies is the PT101 course book.

Here's a question I don't think anyone asked - are you sure your headphones are okay? Are the plugged in all the way? If your headphones have one of those 1/4 inch to 1/8 inch adapters try a new one - I've had them fail.

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by MusicGirl

Yes I started a blank session and it only play in one ear!

And what did you exactly do in that new session? drag over an existing mp3 stereo file onto a stereo track like I suggested? you have to tell us exactly what you are doing. All that suggestion was to see if your hardware (including cables and headphones) work OK or not. If not you need to debug all that.

And be sure to default the IO as suggested.

[MusicGirl]

And be sure to default the IO as suggested.

Yes, I started a new session and I dragged the MP3 over in pro-tools pushed play and it still only plays out the left hear!

I defaulted all the settings!

Cables and headphones: (Sony)Headphones. Regular mic (Cable)

[Darryl Ramm]

Originally Posted by MusicGirl

And be sure to default the IO as suggested.

Yes, I started a new session and I dragged the MP3 over in pro-tools pushed play and it still only plays out the left hear!

I defaulted all the settings!

Cables and headphones: (Sony)Headphones. Regular mic (Cable)

OK great stuff, so as long as the pan knob (or knobs) (on the mix window channel strip) on that track are not just panned hard left then you have a hardware problem (interface, headphone socket, headphone cable, any adapters, or headphones) -- and nothing to do with the Mic or how you are using it. Start by replacing/swapping each of these with whatever else you can.

If you have a stereo track or a stereo master fader the signal is going though it is also a good idea to confirm that both left and right meters are moving.