Monitor Frequency Range?

Jcool

New member
What is an ideal frequency range for monitors? I guess I'm mainly concerned with how low frequencies will sound. I mostly mix and master hip hop music, and I tend to not roll off anything after 20hz because I feel like even if I don't think I hear it, it is adding to the fullness of my kick and bass sounds, and I can really tell a difference on a good stereo system. I figure I would need to get a sub woofer as well. What would be an ideal frequency range for that?
 
30 hz is a good number for monitors. Anything 20-40 should work fine for mixing as long as you keep an eye on super low range levels. If you want to get a sub for mixing, it'd probably be best to keep it turned off the majority of the time to make sure you don't turn down the lows bc your sub is blasting them so loud. It could be helpful as a final step just to skip the "try them out on my friends system" test that most people do.
 
30 hz is a good number for monitors. Anything 20-40 should work fine for mixing as long as you keep an eye on super low range levels. If you want to get a sub for mixing, it'd probably be best to keep it turned off the majority of the time to make sure you don't turn down the lows bc your sub is blasting them so loud. It could be helpful as a final step just to skip the "try them out on my friends system" test that most people do.
Could you recommend me some monitors that start that low?
 
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I have a pair of M-Audio BX8 monitors that I like that work pretty well. I've also known a lot of people with KRK Rokit monitors that are decent too. The Rokit5's are supposed to be pretty good quality for the price but they don't quite have the low end of Rokit8's or BX8's. I'd guess I would recommend BX8's if you have the cash but I haven't ever sat down with a ton of monitors and directly compared them...
 
The key here is having a good sized woofer that can produce low enough bass. 8 inch is a nice number to start.
I'd stay away from rokits. Bass in the rokits is too much fabricated.
KRK just brought out a new line, the V series, those are pretty nice, but expensive.
If you want a decent prized 8 inch, I'd look at focal alpha. I like the mackie and the jbl as well.
Around 700 bucks, I'd look at the krk v8 or genelec. Eve audio, neumann, focal, jbl, mackie and some others have stuff in that prize range as well that is nice.
 
The key here is having a good sized woofer that can produce low enough bass. 8 inch is a nice number to start.
I'd stay away from rokits. Bass in the rokits is too much fabricated.
KRK just brought out a new line, the V series, those are pretty nice, but expensive.
If you want a decent prized 8 inch, I'd look at focal alpha. I like the mackie and the jbl as well.
Around 700 bucks, I'd look at the krk v8 or genelec. Eve audio, neumann, focal, jbl, mackie and some others have stuff in that prize range as well that is nice.

^^^This right here
 
Just as a word of advice, putting big-ass monitors in a room without treatment (even with treatment, the low end is the hardest to get under control) is going to cause more problems than you gain by extending your frequency response with bigger monitors - it's of course nice that the bass bumps, but if you're planning to mix in there, you should aim for accuracy instead - which might mean that, depending on the size of your room, smaller monitors may actually be better than bigger. Also, you have to spend a lot of money to get a pair of monitors that'll accurately reproduce 30Hz (without a sub).
 
Just as a word of advice, putting big-ass monitors in a room without treatment (even with treatment, the low end is the hardest to get under control) is going to cause more problems than you gain by extending your frequency response with bigger monitors - it's of course nice that the bass bumps, but if you're planning to mix in there, you should aim for accuracy instead - which might mean that, depending on the size of your room, smaller monitors may actually be better than bigger. Also, you have to spend a lot of money to get a pair of monitors that'll accurately reproduce 30Hz (without a sub).
Good advice. If you do have a small room and/or not want to spend energy in controlling bass reflection and build up, and you go for accuracy, this'll mean you won't be able to mix your low end properly. There will be a part where the low frequencies won't be hearable or not reliable.

30hz is indeed very low.

Don't always trust the listing of the low frequencies of the manufacturer either. On monitors like the focal alpha 80, jbl lsr 308, mackie mr8, yamaha hs8, you get about 35 to 40 hz. These monitors will lie around 200 to 300 bucks a piece.

Around 600 bucks speakers start to list frequencies as low as 25 hz. The new V 8 from krk, mackie hr8 (9 inch) or the others I mentioned in my previous post.

Mixing in an untreated room, lacking skills and theoretical knowledge, hardware, some software, is always tricky. I'd focus on getting one of those listed speakers where you have the money for and go from there. If you have a small room, controlling the low end will be a challenge. You'd solve that by going for a smaller woofer and sacrificing a part of the low low end. If you have a good room and willing to put some effort in treatment and setup, I'd definitely go with a 8 inch or bigger.

If you're in doubt, get a shop with a proper return policy so you can test it out in your room and the way you want it to be setup. If it doesn't work, you send it back and get a different pair.

Look up on some theory about bass build up and reflections of sound so you can recognize problems better. A lot of it can be solved by bass traps and such, but that needs energy, attention and money to setup. There's a topic somewhere on the forum on how to build it yourself. If you check youtube and google you'll be able to find information about this. On youtube, I like studio rescue a lot :D
 
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As a sidenote: not trying to disqualify the discussion here, but I think the big "problem" with monitors is that trying to reduce their sound to a bunch of numbers is inevitably bound to go wrong; you simply can't tell whether this or that is better from the specs alone. The bass extension matters, of course, but there are plenty of cheapo monitors that claim to "go down there", and maybe they do, by some metric, but it's not probably very accurate and/or nice sounding - and in most cases it sure won't translate very well (to other systems)...which of course should be one of the main goals of mixing. For example's sake, I just checked the specs of a bunch of popular "newbie" monitors, and lo and behold, almost all of them claim to have a "better" frequency response than my monitors, which cost about five times more than any of these :D Or maybe I'm really thick (but I do think mine are a bit better than your basic Rokits and their ilk), dunno.

Of course if you just wanna bang out beats and have it sound "nice" on your end, none of that matters.
 
trying to reduce their sound to a bunch of numbers is inevitably bound to go wrong; you simply can't tell whether this or that is better from the specs alone. The bass extension matters, of course, but there are plenty of cheapo monitors that claim to "go down there", and maybe they do, by some metric, but it's not probably very accurate and/or nice sounding - and in most cases it sure won't translate very well (to other systems)...which of course should be one of the main goals of mixing. For example's sake, I just checked the specs of a bunch of popular "newbie" monitors, and lo and behold, almost all of them claim to have a "better" frequency response than my monitors, which cost about five times more than any of these :D Or maybe I'm really thick (but I do think mine are a bit better than your basic Rokits and their ilk), dunno.

Don't always trust the listing of the low frequencies of the manufacturer either

:)

If you want to go all nerdie you could also grab the frequencie response chart :p

It all comes down to knowing the speaker that you work with in the end. There's gonna be cheap ass crap and there's gonna be high end quality. The monitors I listed are monitors that I've heard and compared. There's always gonna be monitors that I haven't heard and there's always gonna be difference in taste.

Sidenotes and discussions are good ;)
 
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I'm not sure the frequency response charts are exactly trustworthy either - or at least you have to be careful with them, because they're often "engineered" to make the product look nicer - not necessarily falsifying the data, presenting it in a way that makes the deficiencies look smaller and because the values differ, they can be really hard to compare against each other. And again, they are about as useful in telling us how a monitor sounds as trying to figure out a song from looking at the waveform (ok, exaggeration, but still...). Bottom line: do read reviews and recommendations, but in the end you should go to a music store and listen to them, preferably using a piece of music that you know very well. I realize that this isn't always possible...
 
I'm not sure the frequency response charts are exactly trustworthy either - or at least you have to be careful with them, because they're often "engineered" to make the product look nicer - not necessarily falsifying the data, presenting it in a way that makes the deficiencies look smaller and because the values differ, they can be really hard to compare against each other. And again, they are about as useful in telling us how a monitor sounds as trying to figure out a song from looking at the waveform (ok, exaggeration, but still...). Bottom line: do read reviews and recommendations, but in the end you should go to a music store and listen to them, preferably using a piece of music that you know very well. I realize that this isn't always possible...
agreed.
return policy with major webshops can help but not a decent alternative to comparing a dozen speakers.
 
Basically, what you need is "flat", rather than "wide",
20-15khz is totally adequate,
And also try to listen and compare on variety of sources, rather then sticking to single hi-end "reference" monitor system
 
And also try to listen and compare on variety of sources, rather then sticking to single hi-end "reference" monitor system

Agreed. Most of us don't have a high-end reference system anyway, so it's even more important to try your stuff out on various consumer-level systems to get an idea on how it's gonna play out in the real world.
 
>>>>Bottom line: do read reviews and recommendations, but in the end you should go to a music store and listen to them, preferably using a piece of music that you know very well.<<<<

>>>>
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Originally Posted by Lama876 And also try to listen and compare on variety of sources, rather then sticking to single hi-end "reference" monitor system
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Agreed. Most of us don't have a high-end reference system anyway, so it's even more important to try your stuff out on various consumer-level systems to get an idea on how it's gonna play out in the real world.<<<<

The above comments, viewed together, are really the crux of it. You can get used to almost any speakers, if you play music that you know, cold, and you know how it should sound, to you (decent speakers, which is why I added the caveat "almost"). This applies to speaker selection (home audio or pro/studio), mixing/mastering, or working in a new/unfamiliar environment (different studio). start developing a reference disc of music that you know well (not just one style). This can help you evaluate speakers, and be very useful for A-Bing mixes as well. But-- If you have access to other sets of speakers/environments, this can be great for assessing the "real world" possibilities that can come with o.p.s. (other people's set-ups).
 
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