How do you guys deal with different output sources sounding different?

toesalad

toesalad

Inspired
If you are working on a patch, trying to get it perfect, how do you deal with the fact that it might sound crappy on a different set of speakers or headphones? My patches can sound quite different between my studio monitors, my studio headphones, and my in ear monitors. A patch that sounds great in my studio monitors can sound flat and uninspiring in my in-ears, for example. Do you make different patches for different outputs? Or do you just try to balance it out with an EQ block at the end of your signal chain to deal with the differences? Or are there other options I am not thinking about?
 
The Output EQs are a good place to make output specific adjustments. You can select between Graphic and Parametric mode for each. It also remembers your settings of each, so you can actually switch back and forth as needed.
 
That strategy doesn't sound bad, though it sure would be nice to be able to create named EQ profiles to easily switch between different outputs. I guess it might have to be an iPhone camera preset, or old-fashioned memorization :)
 
I make my patches sound great on my CLR at gig volume so they should translate well on any FOH I play through. IF they didn't sound good in my IEM's, I'd eq my IEM feed so it would sound good. I've seen several people on the forum have an eq block and sometimes others on shunts going off their main feed that go to output 2 or which ever one(s) they use for their non-FOH use.
 
I use a GEQ for my phones and turn it off for my FR cab. That’s all I’m using at the moment. The GEQ is based off a correction curve. I altered it to better match the FR setup. Maybe someday we’ll get global output EQ presets. If I’m out for a jam in another space I just use the global eq to make it sound good and leave my presets alone.
 
Pretty much just EQ when I need to. The more important thing is deciding which one you're going to actually treat as "correct" to use as your reference.
 
I test my presets on at least studio monitors, small powered PA speakers, and IEMs. If tweaked to work well on all of those, it should be quite transferable, and FoH can do the rest. I also HPF everything to ensure there are no super low frequencies unexpectedly sneaking through.
 
IEM might be a different story, but I've found that if you tweak your presets on a decent set of FRFRs (at gig volume), they'll for the most part translate well to any FOH setup. If you're finding a huge variance, likely the speaker(s) you're tweaking them on are not accurate enough. For recording I use different presets than live in pretty much 80% of cases.
 
Output EQs,
Also, having a performance page dedicated to the Bass/Mid/Treble knobs on the amp are useful, you can tweak your sounds just like you would on a real amp to compensate for the room or the monitoring system.
 
Option 1: multiple versions of the preset.

Option 2: multiple eq settings in each preset.

Option 3: roll with it and let your ears adjust.
 
Output EQ for sure. I typically run Out 1 (either Axfx3 or FM3) to FOH; I generally keep that flat and let the soundman handle it unless our band is running sound and I will adjust from the Out 1 EQ to get the overall balance working (though unfortunately not always exactly to where I want). Out 2 on my FM3 or Out 4 on my AxFx3 sends a non-IR'd signal to a poweramp/cab; occasionally I have to run into something funky like someone else's combo, and I end up having to do some extreme EQ moves to make it workable.
 
Budda said:
Given the presets, scenes and channel nature of all the eq blocks, im curious what the outboard one offers?
Click to expand...
The ability to set EQ presets across all my FM9 presets. Basically it is like adding the ability to have presets in the global EQ.
 
Also: if you set switch the output eqs (from graphic to parametric or none) the setting are retained. So you could save the eq off when working on your own monitors, program the eq for your band’s regular system on the parametric setting, and a second tuning in the graphic setting. I often think of it as three “presets” per output.
 
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