frequency splitters often use symetric filter transfer functions, which causes latency. within in a pure software enviroment latency can be compensated, in a hardware setup you can not do that so easily.

 

It is more complicated in hardware world, I have read about the filter designs a bit and it seems like it's really a deep subject so I didn't learn further. for Mastering grade unit like the Maselec ML4 the crossover filters are passive first order, meaning it's only 6db slope and it can only do so much for surgical work. Since its passive, the amplification stage will further add inconsistency/inaccuracy to the summing result. So, it's nowhere near linear as transparent that a good MB plugin offers. I've read something weird about people saying the ML4 unit is used by clever Mastering Engineer to shape the area around the common speaker's bass and tweeter crossover point, with the natural phase shift that occurred on the crossover frequency of the mb compressor. There's a sweet spot range and they'll tune it until they (bass and tweeter) the move (in and out) together in right direction together. So the speaker would reproduce the sound better.

Sounds like a bs someone spreads to justify the 8k he spent right ?

but Jack Joseph Puig talked about how getting the speaker to move correctly is important and he always check them during mixing (MWTM). Although it's not the same, but these maniacs can't all be wrong no ?

 

it would depend on the crossover frequency, the speakers are designed with different crossover frequency depending on the frequency range of the driver. There is a lot of magic in any industry, things that are facts and things that are myth blend with time and become habits.

analog was harder than digital, and more expensive, but also in some ways easier and simpler. Now everyone has a plugin to emulate/reproduce all the failures of analog technology. Tape plugins, lofi filters, bad reverbs etc. The human hearing doesn't really want perfection, it wants a subtle failure, a moving target. The ear tires of the same thing, it needs, it has to have, change to stay interested and to give those tiny hairs in your ear a rest.

The ear, the brain,the room, your mindset, the temperature, the speakers, so many variables change what we perceive, a perfect mix becomes less so in hindsight, or maybe we just changed...

 

6db is rare/strange, you usually use 12 or 36, for other numbers you can not correct the phase spectrum distortion with allpasses.*)

you surely can split a signal in that same area many speaker do it too and reduce the sonible artefacts under certain conditions.

but i believe it is too many conditions which would have to be met. and i do not want to be limited to setting up a crossover at a certain frequency instead of choosing where i need it.

and eventually the guy who told you that does not really know how the phase spectrum of a splitted signal looks like.

anyhow, artefact-free splitting only exists when you not going to process the parts. which is usually what you do after splitting. (the exception is loudspeakers, where it works fine!)

*) but what you of course can do in a plug-in or hardware unit is to set up the actual process as parallel process, so that only a smaller part of the input signal is frequency-splitted and processed. this can help a lot to reduce artefacts...

 

Other than workflow, what are the reasons for using mb comps over native band splitters and compressing or applying any fx whatsoever to each band separately?

 

Practicality..
to do it right you will have to multiply the signal and process each band in Parallel, then sum them back up..

Doing it in Series will make one band affect the other, (in terms of Phase..)
so I guess it's better to do it in Parallel with Linear Phase filters..


To do it manually you will need to set up a considerable routing rig,
when it's something a unique plug can do flawlessly..

 

Last edited: Jan 2, 2025

I have actually compared LP on few MB compressors with Pro-MB DP (Dynamic Phase), in parallel, I like the DP better. It's way way more transparent and that's why I think no MB plugin ever come close to that Pro-MB for that. I do like DMG Multiplicity for expansion or surgical work, if it's just to balance thing out, ProMB with DP is unbeatable IMO. I find it strange people not talking about that approach at all, the splitting only happening during the reduction so at the same time you can judge the overall artifact in one go, but most of the time there's no audible artifact at all with 24db/slope on considerable compression/expansion speed.

 

How does it compare to Leapwing's DynOne? They're very proud of the filters for this one, and at the highest filter quality setting I could melt WTC beams on my CPU.

 

I will always use a multiband compressor over a splitter, to do the same thing after it. Workflow, resources, and sound. Maybe you could set them to be perfectly identical in result, but I know I am not going to. The additional wrapper plugin instances, splitting and summing, are only going to ever be "as good" as the single multiband compressor, in theory, In practice, that will not be my result.

 

Tube-Tech SMC 2B
https://www.softube.com/tube-tech-smc-2b

Haven't tried this one,
but if it's as good as the CL-1B.. may be worth a spin

 

you have 2 options when you need to buy beer at market,
option 1 : go in a porsche carrera
option 2 : go in a old citroen

at the end you have the same (beer in refrigerator)
but is not the same.

mixing with hardware mb for me is more funny, maybe for the song is the same . . . but for me is not the same, i am more happy. Maybe i can trasmit something to the song (i dont know).

i like DRIVE my drawmer

 

It's very good.

 

Never tried one but I'm left wondering if the crossovers wouldn't annoy me immensely, since they cannot be linear phase.

 

Another approach could be..
Using Blue Cat's MB-7 to load any Comp (Analog or Digital), or FX that you want in any of the Bands..



It's very out of spec, but one could set up dream MB Comp rigs with this..
Like a Multiband Elysia Alpha Master.. or Multiband Vertigo, Distresor... you name it