StudioLive RM32Ai and RM16Ai Mixers & UC Surface with QMix Ai
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Hey Y'all! :D My name is Steve and I just installed an RM32AI and Logic X in our new youth program's studios and will be sending 6 aux outs to each of two live rooms for headphones and the remaining 4 aux outs to 2 monitor speakers in each room. Everything is working great, but I have a question about headphone amplification. I saw some other posts on the topic, but not quite addressing my inquiry. Here's my question; I have the rack mixer in the control room and prewired headphone jacks in the walls of each live room. Can the input to those jacks from the RM32AI be boosted by the RM32AI to sufficient level to drive the headphones across those outputs to those headphone jacks in the wall or should I amplify them in the control room using a couple of rack mount headphone amplifiers to manage the up to 12 channels of headphones? The kids can control the relative volume of their mixes using their phones or our tablets with QMix. I am trying to avoid the clutter of headphone amplifiers in the live room. Thanks in advance for your support! Steve
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by gbam55 on Sat Feb 17, 2018 3:25 pm
Hi Steve, I believe that you'd only get acceptable results if you send via headphone amps. What are the distances from point A to point B ? If it's only a couple of feet you might get away with it & try it out.

I use a SMpro Audio 6 headphone 1U rack mounted amp. You can get short snake with a D connector on one end and Jacks or Xlrs for input into your head amp from behind the Rm32 for 8 auxes at a time. There are 2 D connectors on the Rm32 & that keeps cabling nice and hidden.

Presonus StudioLive 16.4.2, 16.0.2 (x2), Studiolive mobile, Mac mini i7 Quad core, 16GB, MacBook Pro 2012 (1T Ssd & with all the Ports you need) Studio One Professionnal. Mélodine editor, Fader Port, StudioLive RM32-AI, CS18-ai, KRK VTX4 monitors and KRK 10s.
KRK 10 3 monitors. Yamaha O1v, KRK rokit 10 3 monitors. RCF 725-II PA and RCF 325 stage monitors. Turbosound TQ425/455 DP PA.
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by steveauerbach on Sat Feb 17, 2018 8:14 pm
I thought that perhaps there was way to amplify the output from the Presonus. I mean, it does so much, right? Makes sense based on the output levels. Thanks!
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by basmeijer on Sun Feb 18, 2018 6:46 am
Hi Steve,
I do not use any headphone amps and connect them with own-made Y cables straight on the RM32 aux/mix outputs, so then you nee 2 XLR (female ends) to one female stereo jack Y cable per headphone, and I can confirm that this works great.
Have not tested this with any other headphone brands besides Audio Technica (ATH-M50) and AKG. So not sure if a higher impedance Sennheiser go well with this.

Plenty of headroom, great full spectrum sound (perhaps just a tiny fraction less sub-bass sound but who cares, had no complains about bass yet), no broken outputs, all going well with minimal hardware and driving a total of 9 headphones simultaneously this way (including the connector on the RM itself). And no hassle setting levels at remote headphone amps. I know exactly what is going to the phones.

Perhaps some of us disagree because it is technically not the most elegant solution but it works for me for the occasional recording sessions where there is not a headphone mixers and I find it easy to connect. I can even use the many XLR looms that we have to hook everybody up if the distances in a bigger room require this. This could also prevent to invest in many jack extension cables.

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