Awesome thread, per you, Danny, Bat, Herb, Jeff, and all: 

Nothing to add: Again, ARC is a must, period ... for me.  I don't understand how any can survive without this, and I hate Multimedia (tech support).  64-bit or 32-bit (bridge) ... either ARC is transparent with minimal CPU in my experience.

But ARC monitors must NEVER over-rule multiple monitoring systems: Car, stereo, church, roller-rink, cans, ear-pieces, studio, radio, monophonic places, etc.  You/I must worry about where the song plays.

ARC gets me in the ball-park but I don't have a sub in my studio, just quality Adams (which yield reasonable subs).  A sub should strongly be considered I think most of you would agree.

Blessings,

This is what I bought for the headphones....  http://www.behringer.com/EN/Products/AMP800.aspx

I think it was around $50 or so.... 

I fully support the emphasis on room treatment, however as with real estate the priority is location location location... :)

JD1813


Oh, one techie question tho, for anyone --   and this is an area I am very ignorant about also --   the cabling I had to use from the Monitors into the Edirol box, was 1/4" (from the Alesis amp)  to RCA (on the Edirol).   I am fairly sure that it's this cabling that introduces some annoying hum over the monitors.  I used cheap radio shack cables cause they actually had ones that went from 1/4" mono, to RCA at the other end.   Should I be looking for like gold-tipped or specially-shielded cabling to try to get that hum under control?   Should I be looking at brands like monster cables for this connection?   It would be nice to get rid of that hum, although it definitely did not stop me from getting a really good monitor of the mix.   I don't notice the hum at all when it's playing; only during pauses or when it's stopped, do I hear that bad hum.   I can find no other electrical interference nearby to account for it.   That's why I suspect the cables.  

What you are seeing is the effects of an unbalanced connection.. most studio monitors support xlr/TRS inputs in addtion to RCA and it would be a solid upgrade to move your audio path to a balanced signal chain.
 
In the meantime, the pursuit of hum is part science, part detective and mostly annoying.. but replacing cables of a similar connection type isnt going to solve it... take a hard look at your power distribution system and grounding scheme.. a pwer conditioning strip is a good investment, hum eliminators can work in cases of noise injection into a system from outside sources, and DI boxes can fix a single connection.

Thanks for the tips, Ian.  My amp & monitors give me only 1/4" connections, and the cables between amp and speakers are extremely heavy and well-shielded.   At the amp end, it's all 1/4", no XLR.  So I do suspect the power connection as a source of hum, since I'm only running the amp into a power strip.  I'll see what kind of line filter I can get installed on it then, rather than just new cables.  The end that I'm stuck with is where it has to go into my sound interface with RCA.  Wish I had something better there, but until that box gets replaced, that's all I have.      

I have to use RCA phonos to my NAD amp, and using a balanced cable with a adaptor (1/4" to RCA phono) presents no noise at all. I bought all my stuff from Sweetwater and use their lifetime cables (I have used Monster cables for stuff before - RCA phono to RCA phono - they can go bad also sometimes with a tight connection and pulling on them - and I use thick gauge wire to go to the speakers - because it is actually AC power which are monster cables in the end) and all of that except for maybe the adaptor can be bought from them, and I bought a maybe (I forget without looking at it) a Power strip (to clean up the electrical power going to anything including the stereo amp and computer) probably a Monster again although Furman may be better from Sweetwater also. Works well enough to not have noise or anything because electrical power coming in can be dirty and noisy and and the power conditioner gets rid of all that and all of that stuff with the balanced cables to the stereo or powered monitors whatever is used and such. If crossing cables from the stereo or powered monitors cross a electrical power cable it should be at right angles to each other or kept away from it all together.

Whatever speakers you use to monitor, make sure you can listen to them for hours upon end. I must admit that I like JBLs and for me they are good enough to not cause ear fatigue and have a fine stereo stage image although I sure there are better ones out there and all of it costs so it depends on the budget in the end.