# Mixing on headphones / Focusrite VRM Box



## hardasmum (Apr 23, 2008)

I don't have a perfectly tuned studio space and have one year old twins so most of my tracking and mixing happens in the wee hours of the morning. I hate mixing on headphones and was after a solution. 

I picked up the Focusrite VRM Box for $99 last week. 

http://www.focusrite.com/products/audio_interfaces/vrm_box/


The jury is still out while I get used to using it but my initial thoughts are positive. It won't replace my monitors but it's a good 2 am reference.


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## Guest (Oct 22, 2011)

hardasmum said:


> I don't have a perfectly tuned studio space and have one year old twins so most of my tracking and mixing happens in the wee hours of the morning. I hate mixing on headphones and was after a solution.
> 
> I picked up the Focusrite VRM Box for $99 last week.
> 
> ...


For $99 it seems like an inexpensive experiment. Keep us posted. I have a similar noise situation here.


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## Latiator (Jul 18, 2007)

Indeed, as I'm constantly on the mix in my studio, this looks to be a promising method for gaining different perspectives when seeking the perfect mix. I'm anxious to hear your follow up.


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## mugtastic (May 25, 2010)

thats cool - watched a demo on youtube to hear it in action. definitely seems useful. 

I'm sick of headphone mixing questions being met with the same "use monitors" answer.

we all know headphones are a common necessity for home recording.


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## ronmac (Sep 22, 2006)

I use 2 different sets of headphones as a regular part of my mix check routine, closed back Sony MDR-7506 and opened back Grado SR-225i. They are very useful for that final check of tonal balance. I have looked at the VRM, but think that for my purpose (as a check against my monitors, not as a replacement for them) I would rather not artificially influence the frequency response or spatial imaging. 

Considering that more people use headphones or ear buds as their primary listening source it is extremely important to make sure that mixes translate well (especially stereo imaging and reverb/delay/flange effects) in that medium.


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## hardasmum (Apr 23, 2008)

I've had some more time to test out my $99 investment and I am very impressed.

I started by listening to some tracks I was familiar with. Scrolling through the monitor emulations I discovered some songs only sounded good on certain models while others sounded great across the board.

I felt like when I engaged the VRM it took a bit of sparkle off the vocals, adding a bit of a muffled sound in the mids.

Last night I mixed a basic song consisting of vocals, acoustic guitar, organ and cello. I found it hard to trust my ears when adding EQ to the vocals and guitar. Were the tracks that muddy to begin with? It seemed I was adding too much top and cutting too much in the mid and bottom frequencies. I continued on though unable to reference the track on my monitors.

After a few hours a funny thing happened, the mix started to take shape and when I played back on the other monitor models it was sounding really good! My ears had become so accustomed to the VRM when I bypassed it to regular headphone monitoring the hard left / right panning made my head feel weird. Hard to explain, like when a track is out of phase and there's a little tickle in your head that tells you something is off. I found it hard not to listen through the VRM.

I finished up around 330 am and bounced a couple mixes off to CD and went to sleep. This morning on the way into work I listened to the mixes on my car stereo and was amazed to hear they sounded great! They're really close, much closer than when I've mixed demos on headphones in the past. Listening now at work on JBLs and am still impressed.

The balance between instruments sounded right, the panning sounded right and for the most part the EQ sounded right. My gut instinct was right, I think I carved too much bottom out of the acoustic guitar, but I usually print too much bottom on headphones so I was probably being conservative based on past experience. The vocals sound very good, cutting through with a good reverb balance. They were perhaps a little sibilant, but that may have been a result of ear fatigue rather than a byproduct of listening with the VRM. I'll have to listen with fresh ears tonight to confirm this.

Either way I have a mix that is pretty much finished that I did entirely on headphones. I don't mind going back to make small tweaks rather than huge adjustments. I am really blown away by the results. 

After my first mix I would say the VRM has lived up to Focusrite's claims. With decent flat headphones (AKG K401's in my case) I was able to mix a track into the wee hours of the morning that is very close to being complete. They will not replace mixing on monitors for me but it is possible that once I have had more experience with the VRM I might be able to get closer results with less referencing on proper monitors.

Incredible results for $99, I am not disappointed.


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## hollowbody (Jan 15, 2008)

hardasmum said:


> I've had some more time to test out my $99 investment and I am very impressed.
> 
> I started by listening to some tracks I was familiar with. Scrolling through the monitor emulations I discovered some songs only sounded good on certain models while others sounded great across the board.
> 
> ...


that's a pretty solid and positive review! I'll have to look into one of these, though I don't think my Sennheiser HD280s are all that flat (in fact, I KNOW they're not, but I've never thought of them as mixing tools).


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## hardasmum (Apr 23, 2008)

The only other thing I should add to my review, at one point I heard some crackling on a playback, checked the mix through my Mbox and didn't hear the crackle anymore. I removed a couple CPU intensive plugins and the "crackle" went away. I think it was probably little dropouts from the VRM which takes a S/PDIF output from the Mbox, processes it in the computer and feeds the signal back to the VRM Box via USB. 

I am running Pro Tools on an iMac 2.4 gHz with 2gb of RAM. 

I might have to add more RAM when working with big sessions, we'll see.


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## 4345567 (Jun 26, 2008)

__________


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## hollowbody (Jan 15, 2008)

nkjanssen said:


> I have 4 kids and have always mixed with monitors no matter their ages or who was sleeping. You shouldn't be mixing at super high volume levels anyway. If you can have a TV on in the same house as sleeping kids, you can mix on monitors in the same house as sleeping kids.
> 
> ...and there's a reason people always say "use monitors".


Agreed, but some of us have slightly different situations. I'm in a 2 bedroom apartment with my partner. The bedrooms have an adjoining wall. One is our bedroom, the other is the recording studio/toy closet. At night, even very quiet music is clearly audible. Something like this would get me out of hot water pretty often


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## 4345567 (Jun 26, 2008)

__________


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## hollowbody (Jan 15, 2008)

nkjanssen said:


> I guess what's considered an acceptable noise level varies quite a bit from home to home. I've got my kids (and wife) trained to sleep through a raging rock band in the same house. In fact, my kids get upset when they CAN'T hear us. Lately we've been working on an acoustic set. The other day, my 4 year old found out the band had been over the previous night, and her response was "What?! I didn't even hear you! Why are you guys playing so quiet? Can you play louder next time?"


Hahaha, man, I ENVY your situation. 

I can't wait to get us a house where I can build a sound-proof man-cave/recording studio in the basement.


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## hardasmum (Apr 23, 2008)

nkjanssen said:


> mugtastic said:
> 
> 
> > I'm sick of headphone mixing questions being met with the same "use monitors" answer.
> ...


Hmm. I live in an apartment in an old house. There is no soundproofing between the apartment below me and the apartment above me. My "studio" has been relegated to the corner of a hallway directly outside the room where my twins sleep. There are horrible reflections in the hallway and a huge bass build up in the corner.

Once we get the lads to bed and our apartment in some order it's 10pm. I work as long as I can stay awake. 

Mixing on headphones is currently a necessity and the VRM a godsend!


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## CapitalC (Apr 14, 2009)

hardasmum said:


> I've had some more time to test out my $99 investment and I am very impressed.
> 
> I started by listening to some tracks I was familiar with. Scrolling through the monitor emulations I discovered some songs only sounded good on certain models while others sounded great across the board.
> 
> ...


I decided to get one of these after it was recommended by a guy at Saved By Technology, and I completely concur with your review. Takes a bit of getting used too, but the key for me was to trust it. What shocked me was that my original mix sounded horrible on the VRM Box.....Terrible! So I figured, what the hell, I'll try it on a song I already mixed. I started from scratch and trusted it....and, I like you, ended up with a much better result. I tried to make the mix sound good on as many diff speaker options as I could, and low and behold, when I played it on my monitors, stereo system, in the car, ipod dock, at work......it was fine!

I don't use it exclusively, but I know that if my mix doesn't sound good on the VRM, it can be improved. And I find my mixes on my monitors have improved.....it changed something for me, so if it did anything, it helped me progress as a mixer. ....


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## hardasmum (Apr 23, 2008)

A little follow up on the VRM. I had to mix two songs this week...on headphones at home (working after 10pm with 18mth old twins and thin walls).

I spent one night getting rough balances and burned them to a CD to check the next day. Went back that night and started riding faders and making additional EQ and balance tweaks. 

Listened again yesterday morning, made final adjustments last night. Spent today astounded at how great the mixes sound. Balance, EQ volume all feel right. 

I am flabbergasted! 

When you first start listening through the VRM it sounds like crap. The only speaker model I can bare to monitor through are the Genelecs. But everything sounds really muddy and phasey. 

I tell myself to trust what I am hearing and go about my business. At some point your ears / mind adjust to the illusion. Suddenly the mix is sounding good and flipping through other speaker models sounds better too.

In total doubt until listening back at work, in the car, home stereo, monitors. It works. Magic. I am loving this device.

(Apologies if I repeated anything from previous posts, I didn't read them before posting this follow up)


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