Here's my 2 cents:

If you have nothing else, yeah it's OK to use stereo gear. But like you pointed out, the mixes are not consistent nor do they translate well to other systems. Stereo amps and speakers are built to get a certain "biased" sound..... more bass is the usual culprit.
Same deal goes for using headphones to mix and master with. You gotta be really careful using that kind of gear.

The best bet is to get a good interface and some quality studio reference speakers.

Interface: I love my Focusrite Saffire interface. It is a firewire box but now, I would replace it with a USB Focusrite if it dies. Focusrite has some well known and respected crystal clean mic preamps built in to their interfaces. Be sure whatever you buy has mic pre's, phantom power, and uses ASIO drivers. Input numbers and outputs depends on what your needs are. I have 2 in 8 out.

Speakers: 5" minimum cones preferably 8" with built in power and bi-amped for the highs. For this purchase, I suggest going to the store with some music on a CD. Your music and genre works best. Compare the various models side by side as I did. Note: even though the studio monitors are all supposed to be FLAT in their response, and they will have graphs to show how flat they are, trust me when I tell you that they will all sound slightly different. So that is why you need the CD in your genre. Listen and compare then you can buy the ones that you like the best. Just know that when you get them to your studio, they will sound different in your room than they sounded in the store.

I mix with Mackie MR-5's in the studio and I have added a 10" 100w sub as well. It was a bit of trial & error to get the sub properly balanced to give consistent mixes, but it is well worth having a sub so I can actually hear what's happening at the lower end of my mix. I would not use stereo speakers for mixing, however, I have no problems whatsoever using a Polk Audio sub in combination with the studio speakers. The lower end handled by the sub is narrow and well defined and as a result, the sub choice is not as critical to listening as the studio speakers covering the entire frequency spectrum tend to be. My sub is handling the part of the spectrum under 150hz. Kick and lower bass.

BBE Sonic: for the price.... it sounds good. If it's VST, it should work in BB. However, I never use any plugs in BB.... or RB. I use them all in Sonar because that's where I mix and polish the music. Mostly what I use is the cakewalk defaults. EQ, Reverb, Comp.


Last edited by Guitarhacker; 06/06/14 05:33 AM.
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