Stereo Cab Vs Non-Stereo sounds different

Rinkleton

Rinkleton

Member
So I'm playing around and I had a Cab in Stereo UltraRes because I was playing with using multiple cabs. In the end I decided to just use one so i turned the volume on the second cab all the way down. Both L and R were panned center. So i decided to change the Cab to Hi-UltraRes since I wasn't using the second cab. I had to turn the output down about 6dB. But doing so changes the tone. Not a lot, but just enough to lose some warmth. For me it was enough to ruin the sound I was going for. I figured since the one cab was all the way down it wouldn't affect anything. But I guess it does.

In put was from an amp with Sum L+R. The cab itself was input select as Stereo. Any ideas why it would do that?
 
Can you post a preset with the cab X & Y states set for the stereo & mono settings you described? Then others could test for a difference. Otherwise the thread can turn into a lot of guessing and no clear answers.

One guess is that there wasn't really a tone difference, but you didn't quite match the previous level exactly. Or maybe there was something affected by the level after your cab block.
 
I've been playing with this for a while but I think I finally figured it out. I think you were somewhat correct in that it was a level mismatch. The tricky part was where the mismatch was coming from. It seems that the stereo pan law is set to -6db (at least for the cab block). So if you have a stereo cab - turn the volume on one of them all the way down. Then on the other one, pan it hard left. Then unplug your right speaker or only listen to your left headphone. Play something distorted or very bright. Now pan to center and play. You have to boost volume 6db to get it to sounds the same.

I'm guessing when switching from stereo to mono, the stereo pan law works differently?

Even if you just listen normally and pan a cab, it gets real bright when panned hard but less so when centered. So Fletcher Munson must be kicking in. But I didn't expect that because the point of the stereo pan law is to keep a consistent total power summed from both speakers. And at equal powers FM shouldn't come in to play. So there must be some exceptions with stereo fields. I need to research this more.
 
With a mono cab block the only panning method is the balance control, which works the same way in all blocks (pan law = 0 dB).

A 6 dB pan law will usually sound quieter at center in this example with one cab of stereo cab muted. Around 3 dB tends to work better.

Most of the time 6 dB should maintain level when using both cabs in stereo mode. 3 dB would get a bit louder if you panned one/both toward center.
 
You shouldn't pan the stereo cab IRs center -- you should pan them hard left and hard right.
 
brokenvail said:
I always panned stereo cabs center. I wanted two different cabs but was no playing stereo so I used stereo cabs panned center
Click to expand...

Lot of phase problem this way Man!
If you want a "mix" of 2 cabs IRs in one... use Cab-Lab: make the mix and set the file as 1 cab
 
Admin M@ said:
You shouldn't pan the stereo cab IRs center -- you should pan them hard left and hard right.
Click to expand...

How come when you double click on the pan knobs, the default is + and - 20 respectively?

Also mix engineers have been mixing 2 mic-ed cabs for years. They do have to account for phase issues. So I have to imagine that some of the sound they achieve is due to some (maybe small or large) phase cancellation.
 
GuttaLaser said:
Lot of phase problem this way Man!
If you want a "mix" of 2 cabs IRs in one... use Cab-Lab: make the mix and set the file as 1 cab
Click to expand...

Mixing the two cabs in CabLab with no offsets would cause the exact same phase interaction. You can use the delay parameter in the cab block to offset one of the cabs if needed. You can also set one of the cabs to the Invert mic to flip the phase as well.
 
Only a gen 1 user here....I run stereo cabs, mono send.....I dont notice any phase issues as I have them panned middle. I just like the sound of them blended together...I thought the AFX's had some programming that eliminated the phasing issues you would run into with this.
 
I also have run two cabs in the stereo cab block and never had any phase issues. I think the stock irs are converted at minimum phase anyway.
 
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