[geeks] Stupid recording engineers

[Joshua D Boyd]

On Tue, Jul 23, 2002 at 08:56:46PM -0400, Tim H. wrote:

> I have always mixed stereo sources on mono rigs, am I missing something
> here?  If a sound is in either channel it will come through fine, the
> only possible way it would drop out would be if it were exactly out of
> phase with the other channel.  I am assuming the mono switch on your
> headphones makes the plug act like a mono plug, which actually shorts
> out one channel, this is entirel different than playing it through
> equipment like a DVD player hooked to a mono TV, that will also play all
> the sounds on both channels.  
> 
> If by mono-safe you mean all sounds are in both channels, then that is
> mono, stereo means that the channels are different and you will lose
> something if you listen to either channel alone.

Obviously, stereo means that the channels are different.  But when
summed, nothing should be lost.

Openingup the volume control on my headphones (whoops, I'll need to
get a new pair at lunch since I broke the circuit board), I see that
the mono switch, when on, appears to be just bridging the 2 chanels,
like:

Vr --------------
        |
      Mono
     Switch
	|
Vl---------------

Which actually is a bad way to do it to my understanding, but when on
it is still a basic summing circuit.  I notice the traces are
different lengths, but to my understanding that is only an issue for
radical differences in length, not small differences. 

But to get back to the point, from a quick batch of testing other CDs
(before I broke the headphones that is), none of the others noticebly
drop instruments when played in mono, so I stand by my suspicion that
this recording engineer didn't do his job.  The Mandolin sounds like
it is almost perfectly out of phase between the two chanels.  I
haven't copied the sound to a .wav file for exact analysis yet though.

-- 
Joshua D. Boyd