KVR Audio

Cinebient · Post by **Cinebient** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 11:37 am

Until now i mainly mixed/mastered via some better headphones but i finally need a few cheap studio monitors for this.
I'm still a beginner here and it's a bit overwhelming what is all in the market.
Of course "cheap" is relative but i want some small as cheap as possible boxes which offering a good quality for mixing/mastering sessions.
I work mainly with a macbook pro at home and focus on sound design, cinematic and ambient stuff or atmospheric electronic.
So if someone could recommend some starters i would highly appreciate it.... thank's!

lolilol1975 · Post by **lolilol1975** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 2:40 pm

According to the excellent "Mixing secrets for home recording":
1) don't cheap out on monitors, buy the best you can afford,
2) if you shoot for cheap monitors, prefer ones which have no hole to ones with a hole,
3) at low prices, forget about bass, you won't get it, focus on the midrange (more important) and treble and mix at low/normal volume. You can still check bass with some good headphones.

Accordingly, they recommend the Auratone 5C Super sound cubes, which are famous little monitors that were used to mix Michael Jackson's Thriller, among others, or similarly the Avantone Mixcubes. These are passive, so you need to add a small linear amplifier.

That said, the latest generation of Auratones are not so cheap, and in fact, with the amplifier, they approach the price of a pair of Neumann KH 120A which are excellent pro monitors. If those are still too expensive (they may well be for a beginning home studio), I would go for the JBL LSR308 or Yamaha HS7. These three references are amplified, thus don't need an external amplifier.
Remember that the price is per unit, NOT per pair.

3ee · Post by **3ee** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 2:42 pm

Check out JBL LSR305

Beginner or not, when working with sound in a room, you also need acoustic treatment. At least a little bit for starters...

toine6 · Post by **toine6** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 3:18 pm

Cheap IS relative, as you say... You should have given a price range and tell us what country you are from. Are we talking $100 a pair, or $500?

If cost is the main factor you should strongly consider buying used. People are always getting rid of monitors at a discount so that they can buy the latest thing. Some of those monitors are very good.

ATN69 · Post by **ATN69** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 3:42 pm

Remember that no matter what monitors you buy, it will take time to get used to them. Best way to do that is to listen finished songs that you like and that sounds great to you.

3ee talked about JBL LSR305. I was so close to buy those because they got good reviews from all over. Finally I decided to go for 8-inch monitors. In my local dealer they had M-Audio BX8 Carbon in stock and I listened to them. I liked what I heard. I paid less then 500$ for the pair. Good thing with those is that I can mix and master both as high and low volume. With low volume I still get a good punch from the low frequencies with these .

Cinebient · Post by **Cinebient** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 4:06 pm

Thank´s all, i will check that all out!

chk071 · Post by **chk071** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 4:17 pm

The successors of these: http://www.sonicstate.com/articles/article.cfm?id=154 , the BX5 D2's could be an option, about 200 € for the pair. I have the BX5a's, and even though i don't have any experience with other speakers, i find them quite ok. Surely not comparable with speakers which cost 10 times more, but that's understandable given the price. The only minor thing i would criticize is that they tend to be a little harsh in the highs, but then, maybe that's normal for "analytic" studio speakers.

zenophilix · Post by **zenophilix** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 6:34 pm

Take a look at the Mackie CR3s, $100 for a set, powered.

EdSevered · Post by **EdSevered** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 7:23 pm

I have a set of Event ALP 5 monitors that I picked up on eBay a few years ago for about $150. They sound very good and were very well reviewed back in the day, often compared to the iconic Yamaha NS 10's. Just a thought.

do_androids_dream · Post by **do_androids_dream** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 8:07 pm

EdSevered wrote:often compared to the iconic Yamaha NS 10's. Just a thought.

Which sounded horrible lol. It really doesn't matter too much what you get if it's your first pair - just get some - get used to them and you will be able to make good decisions with them. Your second pair of monitors, in years to come, will be informed by what you've learned from the first pair - that's when you will probably spend more time considering what you want as you will have a better idea of what you want from a pair of monitors.

ramseysounds · Post by **ramseysounds** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 9:36 pm

zenophilix wrote:Take a look at the Mackie CR3s, $100 for a set, powered.

I just bought the CR4's so I can A/B with my 624's. Pretty impressive for the money IMO.

masterhiggins · Post by **masterhiggins** » Sat Apr 30, 2016 11:14 pm

I'm selling my pair of Mackie mr5s.

Cinebient · Post by **Cinebient** » Sun May 01, 2016 7:47 am

masterhiggins wrote:I'm selling my pair of Mackie mr5s.

These looks nice but as long as you not beeing from Germany the shipping would be bad

ramseysounds wrote:
zenophilix wrote:Take a look at the Mackie CR3s, $100 for a set, powered.
I just bought the CR4's so I can A/B with my 624's. Pretty impressive for the money IMO.

The Mackie CR4's indeed looks very interesting. Mostly i can't listen super loud, so it would be enough i think. The CR3 could be enough too.
I saw they are also available as bluetooth but i would need them often for live play and not sure if latency would suck then.

Lejurai · Post by **Lejurai** » Thu May 05, 2016 5:04 pm

M-Audio BX5 D2. Around 220€ pair. If you don't have external audio interface, grab ur22 so you can get some sound out from those m-audios.

bronxsound · Post by **bronxsound** » Thu May 05, 2016 5:13 pm

Lejurai wrote:M-Audio BX5 D2. Around 220€ pair. If you don't have external audio interface, grab ur22 so you can get some sound out from those m-audios.

+1
cheap and cheerful monitors allowing easy mixing.

Cheap (yes i know...) studio monitor!