Studio Equipment for the Home - Your Opinions, Please

I have recently had a discussion with people in a different Internet group, and the idea that we were tossing around was the use of pro equipment for home listening - speakers and amplification in particular.

One of the points raised was that since studio equipment is generally sold to professionals, there is less marketing cost involved in the end user price of the product. In addition, as pro equipment generally does not need to look pretty, less money is being spent on finishes, veneers and the like (for speakers in the first place). This again means lower cost for the consumer, the downside being of course that some studio speakers are butt-ugly

Your opinions please: would you agree that pro equipment represents better value for money than home hi-fi, and in particular the high-end gear?

 

Hello SVL. I'd say the main thing here is speakers.

The home environment is very diffeent to the studio environment. The first thing is that in the studio the listening is near-field while at home you get mostly bounced sounds.

Maybe if you create a studio environment at home you can replicate the studio experience, which is quite stunning. But maybe long-term it could be tiring.

I think your best bets for value are mass-produced but highly-regarded products such as NHT speakers, not in studio gear.

My two cents.

 

I have studio gear in use as my home stereo. I have Genelec monitors all around and they sound wonderful. I also have an Alesis Masterlink as my CD player. There's also some consumer gear in there like an SACD player and my DVD recorder. My receiver is also a consumer Sony. They work together nicely

 

Hey Jamie,

Where the h*ll are the tubes???

-Jeffrey

 

The professional equipment I use is a DJ mixer and a DJ turntable

 

Friends,

I have a mix of consumer and pro gear in my system. Since, I complete some re-mastering work, I find this to be essential.

Bob

 

I totally agree with you Proufo. Besides, SVL already has pretty upscale audio equipment, why mess around with pro stuff?

 

While reflected vs. nearfield listening does depend on the room size and listener/speaker placement, I tend to agree that studio monitors can bee too analytical, so it is largely a matter of personal preference.

Going back to the value for money issue, a lot would depend on how manufacturers price their higher-end or "flagship" product. I would assume they might use three principal approaches (1) use a general cost plus approach (2) price based not on cost plus, but essentially on how many they are hoping to get out of the door and (3) subsidize higher-end product through mass sales of lower-end stuff (not very likely, imho).

I wonder what other opinions we may have here on the mechanics of pricing top of the range hi-fi and high-end products, also as compared to professional audio equipment.

 

I use Genelec speakers (1031s and S30s) at my studio and they are great for tracking and especially great for mixing, but at home I prefer the "colored" sound of my Boston Acoustics. This may seem a little weird but it's what I've gotten used to. The Genelecs are terrific reference speakers with incredible detail and imaging. When you close your eyes, you don't even "hear" the speakers - the sound seems to be coming "out of the air," and the placement of the sounds in the stereo image is unparalleled. As great as these speakers are, after a long day of listening, I prefer the "scooped out" midrange sound of my BA's as opposed to the "flat" reference sound of the Genelecs. It is also a great way way to reference my mixes in two different environments with two different types of speakers.

 

They're all in my racks of compressors and mic pres.

 

Studio equipment uses balanced interconnects. A plus in my opinion.

 

nearfield vs. diffuse field

I don't think all studio speakers are optimized for near field. Hence I wouldn't say that all studio speakers are unsuitable for a home setup per se. They have to be evaluated on a case to case basis. Some studio speakers are optimized for volume, which is not what an audiophile wants.

 

Paul--which Bostons do you have? I have a few classic "A" series pairs around the house, but have just gotten a pair of A150's that I'm working on fixing up and modifying. By "scooped out" midrange, are you talking about a drop in response in the midrange? (That's how I'd take it.) These A150's I have are actually too *forward* in the midrange. Almost painfully so. Considering reworking the crossovers a bit to tame it.

Haven't heard any more recent Boston speakers, but am curious if the type of sound you're describing is a characteristic of their sound.

 

Being lower in production numbers, and having the increased specs (more durable/rugged than home gear, possibly with tighter manufacturing tolerances), I would tend to think the pro gear costs more than home gear. Well, exclusing the "audiophile" fringe, of course...

 

Agreed. They're much more advanced than their RCA counterparts.

My friend has a pair of Mackie studio monitors at home that he likes to listen to. I think it's a really nice idea to incorporate pro audio equipment in the home, it just depends upon the quality, which ranges even more wildly than home equipment.

 

I LOVE pro stuff. I used to use Pro JBL curved horn bass cabinets with 15" 22XXH series low frequency drivers X'd over to a 24XX series compression driver loaded into a huge 2397 diffraction horn mid X'd over to a compression slot loaded HF driver.

The system was amped on the bottom end by a MC2200 series McIntosh amp and the mid and high were driven by a MC 250 amp. The bass was crossed over to the mid-high through an electronic JBL dividing network and the mid-high using a passive JBL network.

I honestly think that this system provided me with the most emotionally involving sound that I have ever had and, were I to consider changing systems from what I have now I would definitely go back to a PRO JBL Bi or Tri amped system probably with 18" drivers loaded into 8-12 cu ft enclosures on the bottom end.

 

Agreed, the main advantage of XLR in long runs is in hum/noise/impedance factors. We also used the large Phone jacks in a lot. When setting up and almost tossing amps around you want to be sure of mechanically secure connections.

 

Anything unbalanced in the field of audio is more prone to 2nd order distortion than any balanced setup, because 2nd order harmonic distortions are to some extent cancelled by the symmetric setup. 2nd order distortion is a consequence of asymmetry. 2nd order distortion is what causes the sweet sound.

On the other hand, balanced setups are less prone to hum and noise problems. A better approach than violating electric safety.

 

Couldn't agree more Steve. After trying both Balanced XLR and RCA the clear winner is the RCA, at least in my system. The RCA's sound more musical, for lack of a better word, to me.

 

High-end gear always loses when taking into account the price-performance ratio

 

I use standard RCA interconnects as well and they sound natural to me as well, and in fact, that's all my system components and the DJ mixer can take although my CD/MD combo deck does allow Optical connections, I don't have an Optical receiver and don't need one either. BTW, DJ mixers can be used as studio equipment as well so I do have a mixture of pro and consumer product as well even with a modest budget.

 

Dilemma: I'm considering a setup for the basement. We're talking about two pairs of speakers at opposite ends of a 50 foot basement. Which would be the best hookup?

1. Long balanced cables running from a central source, to power amps located close to each speaker pair;

2. Long RCA interconnects running from the source, to power amps located near each pair;

3. Long heavy-gauge speaker cable runs to each pair of speakers from a central location.

#1 is difficult because none of my equipment is balanced, and I'm sure buying something balanced would cost more than my budget (which would necessitate either high-dollar gear I can't afford, or pro gear that is overkill for my purposes).

#2 might work--I've made my own long RCA interconnects that didn't pick up any noise. However, I worry about voltage drop at such a long distance. Would have to push the preamp harder to drive the amps.

#3 would work, but I could see having to use some mondo-sized speaker cable that could handle maybe 200-250 watts. I'd consider using that large-gauge power supply wiring for car stereo, since it is larger than many speaker cables. Don't need any of the "audiophile" wiring by any means, but large-gauge would prevent the inevitable voltage drop.

 

Agree 99.9%

Plus balanced equipment is much more electrically complex and expensive to build and buy than single ended.

I prefer the simple approach to audio , as do a lot of manufacturers.



cheerio