I’ve looked around the net a bit,and it seems like the
KRK RP5
has got good reviews all over.
Anyone had any experience with these?
And can anyone recommend any monitors?
They shouldn’t cost more than 300 a piece.
I have the KRK RP6s and they sound fantastic. If the RP6s are stronger anywhere in the spectrum it may be in the mid range. The RP8s have a bit more bass response because of the larger size. Overall they have a nice even response and I have been really happy with them.
Just an FYI from experience. Alesis M1 mkII actives sound good for the price, but the quality/reliability is shit. I’m on my third set. Had to have a friend who knows electronics fix 'em.
If you plan on running them hard I’d go for something else.
I’ve heard good things about the KRK’s. Haven’t heard them but I’d go for the 8" foofers.
Also haven’t heard, but Tapco is an off brand of Mackie. I’d check those too.
I recently bought the Alesis M1 Active 620. Sound great for me 
I hear lot’s of good things about the KRK RP? aswell, I guess you can’t go wrong with them.
wow,thanks for fast and numerous responses…
Yeah,been making music mostly on headphones cuz of my crappy 7 year old VIKING (yay) monitors.
So I guess it’s about freaking time I got something I can mix and master with you know?
Oh,by the way, my “studio” is TINY, I can barely fit myself in there, which I think would benefit from getting a smaller pair of monitors e.g. the RP5s…yep,still holding a button on those
i’ve had a set of these for about a year now and i’m still well chuffed with them. only slight problem i’ve noticed with them is that people keep telling me to raise vocals in the mix, but i understand that’s a problem common to all near-field monitors.
the alesis M1 active 520’s might be better then if you’re short of space.
Ok first thing first, do some reading to understand the difference between ‘sweet monitors’ and ‘true reference’. A lot of stuff sold for the cheaper prices are ‘sweet’, and produce a lovely sound, but a lot of the time hide sonic nasties. They give gloss so to speak.
‘True’ monitors are expensive or a little harder to find, and also depend on how and where you set them up. A lot of mixes sound harsh on these, but stuff that has excellent mixing and mastering should sound mind-bogglingly good on these. You can get very precise with your sonic perfection.
Never mix/master without a separate sub. A tuned 2.1 setup is absolutely essential IMO.
The ideal studio setup has both sweet and true reference monitors, so you can cross check your mix/master. At home, my 2.1 setup has close to a true sound, but I don’t own pro-sweet-monitors. I can get away with this though because most consumer audio appliances have ‘sweet’ speakers, so I can test on these.
I don’t like KRKs - they are too boomy and huge on the bass in the wrong way. Made for making an impression, not for accuracy. Check the web, I’m not alone on that opinion.
If you want some cost effective pro ‘sweet monitors’ try these http://mixonline.com/mag/audio_yamaha_hsm_monitor/ - HSM series would probably be my next buy.
Talk to engineers, not sales assistants.
Also, the bigger the room the better. Gets as much material on the walls as you can, and think about some bass traps…
Hey, Foo?, always great tips on mastering!
Yeah, I’ve begun looking at stuff to put on the walls to absorb sound, to make the room less reverbed.
Hmm…
I’ll check out those Yamahas you mentioned, but why should you use a seperate Sub?
I bought Genelec 8030’s. Sounds true to me.
Nice flat frequence response.
EDIT: Ooops, they cost litlle bit more than 300€…
I’ve got a pair of Yamaha HS80M. (with the 8" bass) And I must say I’m very satisfied with them. I think it’s no coincidence that you’ll find them in 50% of all “studio-photographs” in all studio/music magazines. I heard I pro-music-engineer that said something like -“If it sounds good in those monitors, It’s gonna sound great everywere.”
My best buy ever. (Had Event 20/20 and fostex “wtf?” earlier)
No matter how low your near-field monitors go, they just can’t go as low and true as a sub can. Plus most electronic/club/avant music really needs accurate attention paid to that region. And… we all know awesomely mixed sub bass is totally booyaka.
Hi,
I totally agree with the yamaha HS80M opinion. Went out with a friend recently to get him some monitors and these babies sounded quite nice in the entire spectrum. the KRK’s were not bad but a bit more ‘coloured’ I admit. For that pricerange I doubt you can easily beat them. They also have some options to improve bad acoustics such as low-cut, hi-cut and so on. You should grab your CDs though and go and listen some for yourself - it is not important what we think. What you think counts
What do you mean Bantai?
Is the frequency spectrum on them uneven?
The Yamahas were a little more expensive than my price range…
Anyway in the end, its a matter of how much you’re ready to spend and subjectiv taste. So except if you’re going to become a proffesionnal mastering engineer, don’t worry too much. Every monitors will sound colored in a way or another anyway because it’s physicly impossible to be different.
You will always find people saying you that this specific monitors is wonderful or sounds like shit in a 50/50 proportion.
Just go to your local retailers, check the monitors in your price range, listen to all of them with different sort of music, and take in consideration that they won’t sound the same in your studio than how they sounded in the music shop.
Take also in consideration eyecandy.
As long as you’re not buying 20$ pc speakers, your monitors will do their job anyway as long as you get to know them.
That made the most sense of all the posts so far.
Thanks Lunat.
Will most certainly have those words in mind when the day comes to adopt a pair of monitors. And I will be sure to treat the monitors nice, play only good music on em, mix better and make them proud to be my sponsors:)
for good price/performance ratio i would suggest these monitors:
http://www.turnkey.co.uk/product/alesis-pr…o-monitor-pair/
http://www.turnkey.co.uk/product/tapco-s8-…tudio-monitors/
Yap, they are quite big (8" bass driver), but IMO this is not bad thing (even if you have smaller room), they are still nearfields and you dont have to turn them up loud, but they will still have much nicer bass response than a small 5" monitors.
“8” monitors dont have good bass picture i thing best choice “5” and sub (all famous referense monitors have sub models special for this monitors) KRK RP6 with sub or Yamaha HS50m with sub - powerful tools for mastering and mixing for a little money around 1 200 USD
What I always wondered about is the author’s preference.
I like to have a spectrum with a strong subbass and low queeks (3-6kHz) while composing. By now I’m always mastering with a post EQ (for listening) that fits my preference. Now if I’m used to that non-linear sound, wouldn’t it be better to have biased speakers then? The result shall be neutral after all.
That misconception spreaded by internet musical forum about “linear sound” or neutral sound is a real problem, because it’s physicly impossible. So in fact, all speakers are biased, and like you say, what matters is the way you like them to be biased. So yeah, use what you prefer.