Apple Logic Pro 9 - Manual (Page 32)

To facilitate this, an amplifier and speakers are required. You can certainly use headphones,
connected to the headphone jack of your audio interface, or the home hi-fi to monitor
Logic Pro playback, but this is not recommended in the long term.
You should look at a dedicated set of reference monitors (speakers), and a matching
reference amplifier. Many monitoring systems today have powered speakers, negating
the need for a separate amplifier.
Note: Reference monitors are specially designed speakers that offer a flat frequency
response across a wide range (usually 20 Hz to 20 kHz). These are not your average home
hi-fi speakers, and are usually only available from professional music and studio equipment
dealers.
This type of system is recommended due to the precision it offers. Logic Pro is capable
of delivering CD- or higher-quality audio, and creating your mixes on a home hi-fi will
generally result in music that is not properly balanced.
Put another way, most home hi-fi speakers tend to enhance particular areas of the
frequency spectrum, resulting in mixes that have too much bass, mid, or treble frequency
when played back on other systems. Reference monitors and amplifiers are designed to
provide a flat frequency response, avoiding emphasis of particular areas of your mix. This
translates to a final product that will sound good (or at least, passable) on most monitoring
systems—car stereos, home hi-fi, portable players, and so on.
Headphones
A good set of studio headphones is handy for particular tasks, such as precise EQing and
sample editing. Given the design of most headphones, and the fact that they’re used so
close to the ears, most people find that headphone mixes tend to be too bright or too
bass-heavy.
As such, they are not recommended for general monitoring duties, but they are useful
tools nonetheless. If you are recording groups of people, you will probably need several
pairs of headphones, a headphone distribution amplifier, and a mixing console.
Tip: You should not use headphones for longer than ten or twenty minutes at a time, as
they can cause listening fatigue, resulting in you making poor choices for your mix.
Audio Mixing Consoles
The inclusion of an audio mixer—analog or digital—is based on your typical studio use.
It also depends on the number of inputs and outputs provided by your audio interface
and your working preferences.
For example, if you are most likely to record bands, several MIDI synthesizers, or drum
kits in your studio, you will need numerous microphone and line-level inputs to
simultaneously record the performances of the musicians and vocalists in the group.
32 Chapter 2 Setting Up Your System