I have been following a thread with interest regarding using a well-mixed professional song of our own choice to serve as a reference track to educate the ear and to use as a basis for comparison when mixing our own material.

There is one term I'm not sure I understand properly, although I realize that it's pretty shameful to have to ask for clarification of such a simple thing: Someone said to be sure to listen to the reference track through the mains and not the master. I understand that is to avoid colouring an already fully mastered work with any effects we may have going on our master bus.

By 'mains', does it mean to just send the reference track(s)'s output(s) directly to our interface (in my case, the Octa-Capture 1-2) and continue to send my own material (everything that is not the reference track) to the master bus?

Thanks, and sorry for the idiotic question. I just for some reason never had heard about 'mains' before.

LJ

skinnybones lampshade

By 'mains', does it mean to just send the reference track(s)'s output(s) directly to our interface (in my case, the Octa-Capture 1-2) and continue to send my own material (everything that is not the reference track) to the master bus?

yes

Thank you, scook!

It is even more confusing when they label the "Mains" in Console View "Master". They should be labeled "Mains".

I believe that it would be useful to have an additional hard-wired level of routing between buses and mains, i.e.:

Tracks > Buses > Master Bus > Mains
 
At the very least it would eliminate the need for instructing newbies to create a master bus in their projects, as there would always be one there already.

Hoo boy, now I think I'm confused again.
 
Do you mean that what I thought was the Master Bus all along was just a mislabelled Mains? And that I should be creating another stereo track to use as Master Bus and sending all my instruments and voices to that? and then sending the new Master Bus through the mislabelled Master Bus that's really the Mains?
 
Yikes.
LJ

In both the Track View and Console View you have panes that show track and buses. Only in the CV can you see the "Mains" and it/they have their own pane. The buss pane may or may not have any buses in it. If it doesn't have a buss or buses the tracks will output directly to the main output. The main output is the input to your sound card going to your speakers. Even if you do have buses unless you have routed your tracks outs to a buss they will default to the main out.
 
Buses are made by the user and one can have as many as one wants. We have settled on a standard to route our audio and standard has one "master" buss. All other buses feed into this and it goes to the main out. 
 
I like to have a buss for drums and one for instruments and one for voice.  I also have an auxiliary buss too. I may have more than one aux buss.  I use those for sends and returns. Each has sends on it that can be routed to any buss. Its a tap of the track signal that can go to an aux. This in turn will route its out to a buss, most likely to the master buss. 
 
Again the master buss is used to have total control of and a place to insert final FX for the entire mix before it goes to the main outs. I leave the main outs alone. They stay at unity. What you see in the meters on the master should also be seen in the main outs meter. If not you have a mis-routed track or buss. 
 
I think of the Sonar buss system to be the easiest and simplest system around and very versatile. 

I always thought Mains were speakers, as opposed monitors.
 
The Master bus could be sent to any speakers you like.
You could have another bus sent to a different set of speakers and eq'd differently.
 
It never occurred to me to name a bus after the speakers -- as Mains. But it's easy enough to do.
 
In the studio I don't use the term mains much. I refer to the speaker set specifically.
 
I don't have mains and monitors. I have musicians with headphones. Haha. and headphones mixes... and there could be a whole bunch of those... way more than 2.

gswitz
I always thought Mains were speakers, as opposed monitors.
 
The Master bus could be sent to any speakers you like.
You could have another bus sent to a different set of speakers and eq'd differently.
 
It never occurred to me to name a bus after the speakers -- as Mains. But it's easy enough to do.
 
In the studio I don't use the term mains much. I refer to the speaker set specifically.
 
I don't have mains and monitors. I have musicians with headphones. Haha. and headphones mixes... and there could be a whole bunch of those... way more than 2.

Its a bit confusing too depending on what country you're in. Mains in England refers to electric power from the wall socket.  

John, thank you so much for taking the time and trouble to explain all of that to me.
 
I've always used the "mains" as my "master bus" successfully. But being faced with needing both a master bus and an untreated main bus (for the reference track) threw me into a confusing loop.
 
I think I understand now that I should create a "master bus" for each project. But what shall I call it to avoid confusion?  I only wish I could relabel the bus that's now called "Master" and call it "Mains" so when my brain glitches, I won't get confused all over again!
 
Thanks again, John.