Speaker mapping wrong or Gremlin attack?

[Neil Sherman]

Hi folks,

Really need to get some 5.1 mixes done quick, but the speaker mapping is wrong in the room.

As I pan around the room in a surround panner, FRONT RIGHT [edit] and CENTRE are doing the right thing. However, FRONT LEFT and REAR RIGHT seem to be linked and are playing at the same time.

My first instinct was that i'd messed up the IO for my template, but i've tried old sessions with IO settings that should be ok. I don't even know how i'd be able to create this problem if I tried tbh.

I'm a little out of my depth here. The person in charge of the studio is rarely on site and isn't a sound tech.

Any ideas where you would look?

IO looks ok, but don't really know what i'm looking at with the S6 console or XMON that we have. It's always just worked in the past. There have been rumours going around about people messing with cabling, which i've always thought was silly. Until now maybe?

Here's the setup:

Mac Pro Late 2013 32GB RAM
Pro Tools Ultimate 2021.7.10
S6 M10 (2021.6.7)
Pro Tools HD Omni
Pro Tools HD Native box
Genelec monitoring inc Sub

[its2loud]

It’s virtually impossible to tell you what’s happening without seeing any IO configs, bussing ,monitoring configs, channel and pan pics, etc.

I suggest you start with doing a power cycle of the XMon and full reboot. If you say older sessions work and sound fine, then check that your template, if you use one, isn’t corrupt by creating a blank session with one mono track and a signal generator.

How can Front Left and Center be “working” if Front Left signal is also playing out Right Rear?

[Neil Sherman]

Thanks for your patient feedback.

I meant to type FRONT RIGHT and CENTRE appear to be working fine.

I'll try the things you suggested and come back if i'm still stuck.

[Neil Sherman]

Cracked it!

On the S6, on the monitoring page, 'folddown' was set to mono. How it affects the audio in the room is baffling to me.

Selecting 7.1 (even though this is a 5.1 room) returned the panning to the normal behaviour. this place is in dire need of someone who knows what they're doing. Hopefully it'll be me some day.

N