why does my mix sound totally different eleswhere?????

ok im having a real problem to understand why im having this problem.

once iv finished my recordings in logic and im ready to do some mixing and mastering i roughly bounce my song and burn it on cd to have a listen on my stereo.
when i sit back to listen my ears are listening to something really different. the guitars sound very tinny, the drums sound to loud, the bass has a totally different sound, its more wolly and muffled. its like my little 5 year old cousin played around with it.

the question i ask, is my monitors too good or not good at all? am i doing something wrong when im bouncing, am i doing something wrong when i burn my cd. or is it something else.
in my recording i have added a bit of eq on my recordings and compression but its only a little bit. just to add a bit of sparkle. im listening back in logic and sounds really good. i know the snare is a bit loud or the bass could come down but thats the process i understand. thats why i did a bounce and burnt it on cd so i could see what volume adjustments i need to make. but im not at that stage.

i have a mac g5 2ghz
logic pro 8 (the latest update)
toast burning programme
event 20/20 monitors
motu 896hd sound card

iv spoken to a few people and some say u need some cheap nearfield monitors, or i need new monitors as my events 20/20 are not giving me a true reflection of my song. if thats the case, when im listening to itunes through my monitors they sound perfect.

or do i need to do something in logic (like tick a box which im hoping) the bounce process i do is online, no compressing or dithering.

sorry for writing a long message but i really could do with some help on this.

G5 2ghz, Mac OS X (10.4.11)

Posted on Jan 20, 2008 7:26 AM

52 replies

Larry Mal

Level 2

369 points

Jan 23, 2008 7:41 PM in response to Thomas O'Carroll

I think that iTunes, even when you turn off the "Audio Exciter" or "Sound Enhancer" or whatever euphemism they call it, might still have an EQ curve attached to it. It is designed to play Mp3's and other downloaded music, after all, and it would be in Apple's interest to make the songs sound as good as possible to make it as enjoyable an experience as it can be.

And since an Mp3 is much smaller than a CD file or whatever, it could benefit from a boost so the listener doesn't notice what has been truncated to attain such a small file. Something has to go when compressing, you know? If it was me, I'd boost the bass and maybe some high end, and hope for the best on playback.

I suppose in this theory that Quicktime would have to be more accurate since it is designed to play any media that comes its way, and wouldn't necessarily benefit from any sort of EQ modifying, since it wouldn't know what was coming its way anyway.

This is pure speculation: all I know is iTunes makes things sound different, more trebly I find. And that's what led me to even find the "Sound Achievement Booster" in the first place- I knew something was up there. And even when I have it turned down, I don't believe it's not actually gone really.

Jan 24, 2008 5:44 AM in response to Larry Mal

I still stand by my observation - I've just tried itunes vs QT again. There is no difference whatsoever through my ears.

you said
<<I suppose in this theory that Quicktime would have to be more accurate since it is designed to play any media that comes its way>>

Well, iTunes can play anything that quicktime can - even uncompressed multi 100GB movies.

MP3 or AAC will sound different to uncompressed formats but wont have less bass or treble in so far as EQ would make them "better" again. There is no logical reason to apply EQ to compensate for the compression. Indeed iTunes is just a GUI/librarian for QT.

I'm going to stick my neck out on this one and say its all in your minds!
(be kind now!)

Jan 24, 2008 6:10 AM in response to Thomas O'Carroll

I have just tried the same and there IS a difference... I always thought iTUnes was sounding a little different compared to playing it from PT or Logic. After this thread I decided to analyze it...

I did this:

With Audio HiJack Pro - I recorded the same track playing from iTunes and then playing from Quicktime... Then I imported those into PT and flipped the phase on one of the tracks. Although they had equal amplitudes they did NOT cancel out. So there is a difference.

Now - it is up to us or Apple to find out which one of iTunes or QT is sounding correctly.

Jan 24, 2008 6:54 AM in response to SteveDjokes

Oh flippin heck...
I'm going to have to do some proper experiments now aren't I! lol.

Logic and protools etc, have their own audio engines so its less surprising that there'll be a different sound to them.

I'm just asking steve, but how do you know for sure that you have the two results from Audio Hijack perfectly aligned and exact same amplitude? What did the result sound like?

ciao

Jan 24, 2008 7:15 AM in response to Thomas O'Carroll

Hi Thomas,

well in order to assure that first I recorded the same track twice from Itunes and then from QT... When flipping phase they cancelled out respectively.

It is easy to align with 100% sample accuracy in Protools. So that is what I did.

The iTunes VS. QT did cancel out only not 100% like it should indicating that the sound is most definitely not the same. It did drop significantly in volume but not completely. To tell you what it sounds like is impossible - do the test yourself. That is always better than believing what other people say.

Best

Steve

Larry Mal

Level 2

369 points

Jan 24, 2008 8:23 AM in response to SteveDjokes

Someone- maybe even you, Steve- used that same test to figure out if Logic and Pro Tools recorded things exactly the same. According to him they do, which is what I would have expected- this is without effects, and through the same converter of course.

Never occurred to me. So I rush right over to see if anyone wanted to do the same thing for iTunes and QT and here you've already done it. Maybe I'll try it later myself.

blayzay

Level 3

630 points

Jan 24, 2008 10:00 AM in response to SteveDjokes

I don't want to big myself up too much on this topic of iTunes and Quick-Time,

but if your ears aren't sharp enough and what ever your mixing on isn't accurate you won't hear it or its shaded!

Q.T. sounds open and it shelve the Sonic sound in a way that you can hear more clearly the tops on Q.T. stands out as well, however on the meters it reads the same D.B.

E.g. its like the way you would place the Adoptive limiter to the main outs of a song but hardly pushing the A.L, which stay at the same D.B. but gives off a bit more room and Clarity, believe.

And that is a fact.

SteaveDjokes i'll post back to say why i think your not hearing the difference.

Fr.BlayZay.

Jan 24, 2008 10:28 AM in response to blayzay

Hi Blayzay,

It not that I had to do the phase cancellation test to notice a difference. I always thought that iTunes was sounding different than the rest.

A fact remains that when I was comparing music and masters I would NEVER use iTunes -

IMO iTunes is messing with the transients on a Mix. It does not come thru' clearly.

Maybe the reason for your thinking that the high end is wider and open in iTunes is that maybe you have the sound enhancer enabled in the preference pane PlayBack.

Jan 24, 2008 10:36 AM in response to old powerbook g4 airport help!

don't mean to veer this thread off course, but just a quick question...

I want to compare my mix to some reference CD mix I'd like to emulate, would I...

play the CD mix in ITunes (with Sound Exciter turned off) or QT (and if in QT,
how do I get the CD into a QT file?)

and compare that with

... my unbounced Logic mix played in Logic?

Thanks

Tom

Jan 24, 2008 11:42 AM in response to Larry Mal

Okay, thanks!

As to the Logic side of things, I'll go with what I understand to be the case... that there should be no difference in the sound of the mix straight out of Logic versus an uncompressed bounce of it.

Jan 24, 2008 1:18 PM in response to ears4sound

ears4sound wrote:
As to the Logic side of things, I'll go with what I understand to be the case... that there should be no difference in the sound of the mix straight out of Logic versus an uncompressed bounce of it.

Thats true.
Larry provided a nice quick way of playing your tunes for sure, but even following this itunes vs qt discussion, it would be unfair to rule out itunes as a suitable music player for your mixes.

Jan 24, 2008 1:40 PM in response to SteveDjokes

SteveDjoke,

Ok I've tried the Audio HighJack thing. I played the same 24bit, 48kHz WAV file from itunes and Quicktime and recorded the result in Audio HighJack. I set AH to record in 24bit 48KHz AIFF (I couldn't see a WAV option but that shouldn't affect audio quality anyway).

I put the results in logic and in the arrange page I lined up the wave forms and, true enough, when one channel was phase inverted there was indeed a very low level sound. It sounded like the track was being played through someone else's ipod headphones - all "tissy". All this suggesting itunes music sounds different to quicktime.

I compared the sound of each file on its own and they still sounded the same to me.

Scratching my head, I then tried a second recording from qt and lined the track up with the orginal QT file and it cancelled out totally when phase reversed. Again more confirmation to what you say.

By now I had moved the itunes track "out of the way". Just for the heck of it I placed the itunes track along side the first QT track again, but this time I used the *sample editor window* to line up the wave forms. And guess what?! They cancelled out to silence.

I am surprised by this! This suggests to me that...

a) itunes and quicktime really do sound the same folks!
b) either the arrange window is not really sample accurate as claimed or the waveform displayed in the arrange window is not really accurate.

I didn't spend that long doing this so perhaps the answer lies in the fact its easy to not quite get things lined up properly as shown in my first attempt (?)- just a sample or two and things go wrong. I dunno!?

Jan 24, 2008 3:59 PM in response to Thomas O'Carroll

Yes, certainly, I'll make my own judgement about ITunes and QT based on what I can or cannot perceive. I found this whole thread educational, but by no means conclusive. With unlimited resources (money as well as time), I suppose maybe I'd pursue the ultimate sonic environment. As it is, I've got just about enough time to be passionate about making music first, and then to work at recording my music secondarily. This forum and all the knowledgeable participants is a great resource!

MAFMusic

Level 1

29 points

Jan 24, 2008 6:31 PM in response to ears4sound

Yikes!

It seems to me that this has no resolution!

I listen to 4 different sources playing the same piece through the same reproducer.
Each one sounds somewhat different.
Which one is right?

Who knows? LOL
Does the "right" one even exist?

The obvious answer is the one that sounds best to you. 🙂

If an equalized or "excited" version sounds better than so be it!

In the world of speakers, or in comparing LPs versus CDs versus SACDs, etc, the standard is usually the sound of live music.

Based on aural impressions when listening, because doing technical analysis can drive u nuts fast!
I find that in some cases an LP sounds more "real" than a CD after extended listening.
In theory the CD "should" sound better, based on traditional measurements.
Why is this so? Who cares!

So I record my voice into Logic, and listen to it without any processing.
Does it sound like me?
Ideally it should (closer at 24 bits than 16 bits).
Then record into something else like quicktime or whatever.
Which one sounds more like me?
Ask people who know your voice well.
Play back on a good reproducer.
Do a double blind test.

If one gets consistently gets higher marks then that is the "reference" playback I guess.

If the music is generated completely within the computer then there is no live reference.
Then Logic would have to be the reference: there is no other!!

Have a great day!

Jon H.

Level 2

195 points

Jan 24, 2008 7:38 PM in response to old powerbook g4 airport help!

Ok, I just did my own phase cancellation test...by accident!!!

I recorded the latest Alicia Keys single in AIFF format with audio hijack in order to do the test, but while I was playing it, my roommate's cat happened to be meowing annoyingly (it was hungry or something). And guess what...there was silence! The cat and Alicia Keys totally canceled each other out. Weird, huh?

So I used a vocal extractor plug-in and removed Alicia, then recorded the cat with my U-87 and dang, if that didn't sound good. Now I have a hit record, but I can't use it since I didn't write the tunes and I'd have to pay royalties and all that garbage. Darn.

Anyway, in reply to the OP: when you mix, make sure you have a cat in the room. It might help you make your mixes sound like a major-label hit. Or treat your room. Either way, it's up to you.

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why does my mix sound totally different eleswhere?????