Headphone system

I'm using sonar 6 with motu 896, i'm looking to get a headphone distributor where each musician can do there own mix, Like the system from Hear company or furman. Anyone have such a hookup,or know how it could be hooked to the motu unit.

Hi Dave,
I have a furman HDS-6 with 4 HR-6's that I use with an 896 and it works fine, although it is a bit soft for folks who have very loud instruments (drummers mostly). You hook the HR-6's up to the main unit in sequence with a pair of RJ-45's. The main unit has 1 stereo in and 4 mono ins. What I do is take a stereo pair off the 896 and run it to the HDS for monitoring the already recorded tracks (via a send off the mains in Sonar) and then use the 896 software mixer to send the players their tracks. I've taken one output off the 896 and run it through an outboard FX module so that I can dial in some reverb or whatever to one performer (usually the vox).

All in all, it's a pretty good system that is inexpensive....there are some better setups out there, but the ones I've seen begin getting very pricey very quickly.

Good luck
Dean

Thank's Dean, Thats the system I was looking at.

Mike , as much as I like mackies things... if your not in the states it's a whole world of hurt... 6 weeks shipping I had to deal with 2 times now..

once for speakers , once for a BK (the controller with the silly name..hehe)

IIRC I got it at Musicians Friend about 2 years ago.

I wonder if they are going to replace it with a rackmount? The mini desk form factor is not a plus for me.

Fog, a six week wait sounds silly for mass produced gear like this. I'd pass as well.

best regards,
mike

I heard a demo of the HEAR system at AES a couple years ago and it looked really nice and sounded good. Been thinking about getting it since. But I don't have any real experience using it myself. The feature I liked about it was it uses CAT5 (network cable) to connect to the remote stations which seemed really convenient and the fact that the musicians can set the mix and volume on the remote stations. So in other words, you don't have to set the mix for individual musicians, they can do it themselves.

Looks like they are powered by the hub through the cat5 cable.

http://www.heartechnologies.com/hb/hearbacksystem.htm

"A basic Hear Back system consists of a Hub and personal Mixers connected using standard CAT5E cables. A single Hub supplies signal and power to a maximum of eight Mixers."

Magic.

I don't know. I just briefly looked at the specs. I've been interested in getting a headphone distribution system myself in which the musicians could control the mix and free myself of the burdon.

I use the Hearback system and am very pleased with it. I usually set mine up like this:

Channel 1/2: Stereo Pair used for playback of some arbitrary basic set of tracks.
Channel 3-7: Individual instruments/vocals that the performer may want to tweak.
Channel 8: Reverb (or Delay) return for the performer to adjust the amount reverb they want to help them deliver the best performance. Most singers seem to really like having control of this.

Normally after just a couple of minutes of instruction the performer can take total charge of their own mix. There have been a few non-techy types that have need a little help.

Each remote has two headphone outputs and I have not had any problems getting enough volume out of them. I haven't had a need to record a drummer who needed an extremely loud headphone mix but these get quite loud. I even get sufficient level with the older AKG 240m 600ohm headphones.

The cat-5 connections make things very easy to setup and get the remotes where you need them.

Just a quick note regarding the reverb feed to the headphones. I run direct monitoring for most of the tracks being recorded but the reverb is coming from Sonar plugins. This lets me virtually forget about latency. Any latency on the reverb is just a little pre-delay for the reverb signal. It doesn't cause any problems even at relatively high latencies as long as the main monitoring is direct.

I certainly wouldn't want to go back to having to create a bunch of mixes for everyone with headphones during a session. Much easier to let them do their own and after a few minutes most people don't have any problems getting them set just the way they want them. I see a lot of people tweaking them even during their performance. That would be very difficult if the AE is setting up all of the mixes.

Don

don4777
I use the Hearback system and am very pleased with it. I usually set mine up like this:

Channel 1/2: Stereo Pair used for playback of some arbitrary basic set of tracks.
Channel 3-7: Individual instruments/vocals that the performer may want to tweak.
Channel 8: Reverb (or Delay) return for the performer to adjust the amount reverb they want to help them deliver the best performance. Most singers seem to really like having control of this.

Normally after just a couple of minutes of instruction the performer can take total charge of their own mix. There have been a few non-techy types that have need a little help.

Each remote has two headphone outputs and I have not had any problems getting enough volume out of them. I haven't had a need to record a drummer who needed an extremely loud headphone mix but these get quite loud. I even get sufficient level with the older AKG 240m 600ohm headphones.

The cat-5 connections make things very easy to setup and get the remotes where you need them.

Just a quick note regarding the reverb feed to the headphones. I run direct monitoring for most of the tracks being recorded but the reverb is coming from Sonar plugins. This lets me virtually forget about latency. Any latency on the reverb is just a little pre-delay for the reverb signal. It doesn't cause any problems even at relatively high latencies as long as the main monitoring is direct.

I certainly wouldn't want to go back to having to create a bunch of mixes for everyone with headphones during a session. Much easier to let them do their own and after a few minutes most people don't have any problems getting them set just the way they want them. I see a lot of people tweaking them even during their performance. That would be very difficult if the AE is setting up all of the mixes.

Don

I know this is a old thread so I hope someone is still out there watching because I need help in understanding a few things. I am now looking into the hearback system or something close to it, I have the Motu Ultralite which I use mainly for vocals and Roland Octa capture for drums. 
1. Is there a way to combine both interfaces so that i can use them together?
2. The concept of sub mixes is one that I don't quite understand I think. Sonar I hear has the ability for sub mixes anyone care to explain that please?
3. I can wrap my brain around individual instruments going to aux send out but how would you get an entire drum kit mic'd with 8 mics sent to one channel?
4. The goal is for every musician to control their own mix I would assume I need all separate sends out of Sonar into what exactly?  I read for the hearback there is a card that has 8 analog inputs I am assuming I would connect those eight inputs into the analog outputs of Motu or Ocapture or ???
5. In Sonar does that mean each output on the tracks is not using the master audio output channel to one of the analog outs on my module?
5.I have heard the term use the aux input on the hearback system for more me, how is that possible let's say for a guitar player?  If his guitar is in the main DAW for recording what is used to send him back into the headphone system as an aux?
 
I want to make sure I understand the concept before I buy any and all help is appreciated I am a newbie at all of this so thank you for taking the time to answer some of my questions

You should start your own thread in the hardware forum where this belongs. 
I'll answer you there. 

Been using the Hearback for many years, probably not too long after my earlier posts. Haven't had an issue with quality at all. No ones ever complained. Been very happy with the system.

There are some limitations as far as using as a descrete 8 channel individual mixer. Channels 1&2 are always stereo. Has not been a problem as I usually use 1&2 for drums. Channels 3&4, 5&6 and 7&8 are either straight up the middle or hard panned with the link button on for each set individually. Also, the limiter is a waste as it does not sound good. But really, the limiter is not needed.

Looks like Hear has a new system out, HearBack Pro and it sounds like the panning issues may have been taken care of. That's probably the unit I would have gotten if they had had it when I bought mine.

Overall, the Hearback has worked out very well. Has made tracking much easier as the guy working the board doesn't have to constantly tweak the headphone mix for the musicians. The musicians can do it themselves.

I work in a home studio/writer/arranger/composer environment, as I suspect a lot of Sonar users do.  Good foldback is so important to the creative process I think it's really neglected compared to all the discussion about new software toys.  The great news is that hardware is now so cheap there are readily acessible solutions for those who can't justify/don't need the pro solutions discussed (very informatively) above.  For me, hardware is the way to go: no extra CPU load and independent control.  The quality of foldback sound isn't so critical as for the recorded signal, so cheaper stuff will do, and even the cheap stuff is pretty good.  I use a UK £99 6-into-2 mixer (Alto ZMX122fx), which is OK quality and has on-board Alesis effects, so a little reverb to juice up the vocals is right there (not recorded, of course).  I use a separate AKG head-worn mike and consumer headphones, and a blue-tak attached piezo bug (John Pearse, £34) for acoustic instruments.  All I need from Sonar is to insert a send to a stereo foldback bus for a backing/metronome signal running into 2 line inputs on my mixer.  I do use a VS-100 audio interface which has 3 pairs of audio outputs - but even with a stereo-out-only interface you could take the headphone-out and drive the foldback mixer with that.  Of course I still use large diaphragm condenser mikes for the actual recording.  The huge plus of this approach is that latency is just not an issue - and even with midi, I say get the notes down and play with the sounds afterwards.  Works for me!